Bourbon Before Breakfast
by latbfan
Summary: In-canon collection dedicated to Mystic Falls' favorite pastime (no, not killing in formal-wear): day-drinking. Each chapter is a stand-alone story told from a different POV, depending on who's doing the day-drinking and why. Focused predominantly in S4, but I occasionally move around chronologically and revisit some of my favorite drinking scenes from the past.
1. Ticking Time Bombs

_A/N: This project will be a multi-chapter work dedicated to Mystic Falls' favorite pastime (no, not killing in formal-wear): day-drinking. Think short story collection rather than novel, as each "chapter" will actually be a stand-alone story told from different points of view. I will stay in canon for the duration but anticipate moving around chronologically. I envision visits from characters past, expanded views on some of my favorite scenes from earlier episodes, and fill-in-the-blank moments I like to imagine took place during commercial breaks. If you have any suggestions or requests, feel free to let me know. "Justified" should be here, since it was the first day-drinking story I wrote, but since I posted that as a one-shot, this next-first one is Damon's POV from "The Rager." Rated M for language and maybe smuttiness later. Huge shout-out to CreepingMuse, who I can't thank enough for being such an encouraging (and honest) beta. Raise your glasses, mates! Cheers._

**Ticking Time Bombs**

Fan-fucking-tastic. Yeah. I could've gone with something more subtle. I really don't need to be bludgeoned over the head with the idea that no matter what I do (I can either stand still and wait for a vampire hunter to come home and kill me, or I can move and blow myself up), I'm fucked. Thanks, universe. Really feelin' the love.

I'm smarter than this. I really am despite all evidence to the contrary, seeing as how I'm skewered like a kabob. Thank Christ this sadistic fuck didn't vervain his arrow tips, or then I'd really be in trouble. How did I not see this coming? Of course an experienced hunter wouldn't allow just anyone to walk into his not-so-secret lair.

It was the trailer that threw me off. How can you have any respect for someone who lives in a fucking trailer? That, and I admit to being distracted and off my game.

Fucking Stefan. Yes, I'm grateful he made sure I wasn't dead before cold-cocking me, but I had to tweeze out all those fucking bullet splinters myself, which wasn't a great way to spend my evening. And then he pulled that stupid stunt with the lanterns. Let's all cry and feel our pain and set it free and pretend we're Japanese instead of actually doing something real, like, I don't know, keep Tyler Lockwood from getting his venom jacked in the hospital. Thanks, Stefan. That was time well spent. And then he has the fucking balls to accuse me of being dramatic? Me? Oh, and he wants to help, but first he's going to show Elena how to have fun.

I'm all about fun. Fun is my middle name. But Stefan? Hmmm. Let's see, the only time Stefan ever truly has fun is when he's up to his own eyebrows in the bloody hole where someone's head used to be. I swear to fucking god, the only time he's not brooding is when he's ripping someone apart. And you know what, it's not just Elena's transition that's been depressing. It's this whole godforsaken town. It was depressing as all fuck when we were alive, and guess what? It hasn't changed. Why do I insist on calling Mystic Falls home when the world is filled with much better locations? Oh right: I do stupid things. Like come back because I think I love someone and am deluded enough to believe I can save her, except, as it turns out, she didn't need to be rescued, and she doesn't want me. And then I inconveniently fall in love with another girl who's in love with my brother because the first go 'round wasn't enough fun. I did my fucking best to keep her safe, but I couldn't protect her from herself. What can you do about a girl with a death wish? And now she's another vampire who doesn't want me.

Good riddance, Mystic Falls. I can't wait until you are a distant memory in my rear-view mirror.

You know how as soon as you know you can't move you feel the need to scratch your nose or sneeze? Yeah. That's me. Which is why I damn near answer Elena's call, just for something to do to distract me until the cavalry arrives. 'Cause an arrow through the chest isn't enough pain for one morning. How's that for subtle metaphor? I haven't even eaten breakfast, for fuck's sake. And oh, yeah, she's having a real good time with Stefan right now if she's calling me.

Great fucking day when the best thing you have going for you is one of the two arrows was only a nick to the thigh and easy enough to rip out without detonating a bomb. I'm walking on sunshine.

When my phone rings again, I roll my eyes at baby vampires with no impulse control. Except it's Jeremy, who never calls me.

"What happened?" I demand.

"Why does everyone always think something's wrong?" he asks. Normally, this sort of time-wasting would piss me off, but for the moment, distractions welcome.

"Because something _is_ always wrong. And you don't like me enough for a friendly chat. Spill."

"The hunter's at school."

I appreciate his getting right to the point. "Dammit." Shit. Fuck. Shit. Dammit. Fuck.

"Basically. How soon can you get here?"

"I'm a little tied up at the moment," I say. "Call Stefan."

"He's here."

"Then why are you calling me?"

"Well, he knows the guy's here. He saw him too. But he and Caroline and Elena had a physics test."

I clench my fist so tightly I damn near break another phone. Stefan's idea of showing Elena a good time involves making sure all her homework is complete? What a fucking idiot.

"He has several college degrees," I snap.

"I just thought you'd know what to do." he says.

I breathe as deeply as I dare to without blowing myself up and try not to think about the fact that Jeremy thinks he can depend on me. Talk about proverbial arrows through the chest. What a fucking nightmare. I want to climb out of my own skin.

"He says," Jeremy continues in my silence. "The hunter guy? That because I can see his invisible tattoo, that I'm a hunter too. That's what he called it, a hunter's mark. I guess that's why no one else sees it but me? I thought it was maybe like the ghosts. But he said I could be a hunter if I wanted. It was really weird. I thought he was a social worker or something, only he wants to train me to kill vampires. Oh, and I know where he lives."

Who'd have thought Jeremy fucking Gilbert would be asking me what he should do when someone shows up and offers to teach him how to torment and kill vampires. I snapped the kid's neck not too long ago. What is it with Gilberts and their unflinching ability to forgive? It's obnoxious. No one's that nice. But if Conner's talking to Jeremy, wanting to turn him into a trusty side-kick...

Yeah, this is good. I can work with this. And let's not forget Jeremy isn't nearly as helpless or naive as Elena likes to think. The kid has mad-skills with a meat cleaver.

"Already figured out his address," I say. "But thanks for the tip. Is everyone okay?"

"There was a thing with Rebekah in history. Stefan said something about a pencil? And Elena is... I don't even know. Matt's acting weird, like maybe he's sick, and Tyler didn't come today and he's being all secretive about why..."

"Is anyone injured?" I interrupt. God spare me further proof that high school is indeed hell. "Dead? In more immediate danger than usual?"

"No. Not that I know about."

"Good. Go to class. I'll call you back."

"Why?" he says, all petulant teenager again, reminding me he's just a little kid.

"Ditch, then. I don't care. Just don't get killed in the next couple of hours."

"Are you trying to be a dick?"

"No, it just comes naturally." I hear Meredith's car down the road. About fucking time.

I sigh. Ric really cared about Jeremy. And he's lost just as many people as Elena, and now the only person he has left is dead-ish and probably trying really hard to not rip out his throat and suck him dry while he sleeps.

"I'm glad you called," I say more kindly. It's not even entirely untrue. "And I'm going to need your help to catch this douchebag. I'll call you back with the plan."

"Yeah?" He sounds all hopeful, like he's really pleased I'm saying he can risk his life. Again. Fuck me. How the hell did Ric do this?

"Yeah."

I hang up when Meredith's car comes to a stop outside the trailer.

Meredith wasn't my first choice. No, that would be Ric, who I've taken to speaking to every night through six feet of dirt. Nor is she my second choice, but Stefan, despite his "I'll help" would be too complicated at the moment on account of a little blood sharing amongst friends. It's like accusing someone of making out while doing CPR. It was a life-or-death situation, I was totally justified, and in the end, it hurt me a lot more than it hurt him. Cry me a river, Stefan.

I wouldn't have thought Meredith was anywhere on my list of people to call for help. Actually, I never even wanted a list of people to call. Before I moved back here, I was perfectly independent. I didn't need side-kicks or partners in crime or a fickle brother who will save me and then punch me in the face. Now I've gone all soft and needy, and it's disgusting. But here she is. Desperate times and all.

Meredith turns off her car but doesn't get out right away. I hope she's looking around, taking in the surroundings, making sure she's not walking into a trap. With any luck, being a Fell and long-time blood-jacker of vampires taught her a thing or two about self-defense. She finally walks over to the trailer, and I carefully shift my weight to counter her movement as she climbs inside. Fucking trailers.

"Why were you being so cryptic?" she asks.

"Come in. Close the door." I hear her heart hammer as she takes in the scene, me stuck through with an arrow with a taut wire attached to a bomb. Yeah, doc. Get the big picture. Absorb. Use that big brain of yours.

"Tell me that is not a bomb," she whispers, as if speaking loudly will spontaneously detonate it.

"Okay," I say. Christ, there's just the one to deal with now. At least it's not _bombs_, as in plural. "It's a kitten. It's an adorable, exploding kitten." I can't see her, but I imagine she'd hit me right about now if there weren't the chance we'd both end up in very small, fiery pieces.

"Why didn't you call your brother?" she asks.

Oh, way to the get to the white-hot center, sexy psycho doctor. What, just because Ric was my friend she thinks she gets to play shrink? I don't need a shrink, goddammit. I need a surgeon's steady hands.

I don't know who I hate the most right now, but I'm pretty sure I'm beating out all the competition.

* * *

We don't blow up. I'm calling it a success because... well... I just am, dammit.

"Let's get out of here," Meredith says, putting her arm around my waist and trying to help me down the steps.

"No need," I say, shrugging her off and pocketing the suicide letter Pastor Young wrote to his daughter. We need to find out if she never got it, or if she got it and handed it over to this fuckhead. Add that to the list of shit we don't know.

"Damon, you don't have to pretend to be so tough all the time."

Actually, doc, I do. I glare at her.

"Just because Ric told you things he shouldn't have doesn't mean you get to repeat them. Got it?"

"It's your own fault for confiding in a chatty drunk," she replies without hesitating. Feisty. Smart. Fast on her feet. Handy with a big fucking knife. I like that in a woman.

I grin. "Touche."

"I'm not sorry I took your blood," she blurts out, as if she's been thinking about it for a while now and waiting for a chance to get it off her chest. "Just so you know. In case you're waiting for an apology."

"I'm not much on apologizing myself," I say. And yeah, I was pissed about that, but since it means Elena's alive-ish, as far as I'm concerned, all's well that ends well. I'd tap a vein for that any day, no roofies required. Not that I'll ever tell Meredith that. Besides, I have bigger fish to fry.

She looks around and realizes that I ran here before nodding towards her car. "Want a lift?"

"Yeah. I've had better mornings." I bite my tongue so hard I taste blood so I don't moan when I get into the car. She's looking at me like a doctor, all professional and concerned, so I pull out my flask and offer her a drink. She shakes her head. "Oh come on. It's bourbon, not blood. Like you said, Ric was a chatty drunk. I know some of your secrets too."

"I don't think it's a secret that I day-drink. Most of the good citizens of Mystic Falls do. And you look like you could use blood a lot more than you could use the bourbon."

I shrug. "You keep a stash handy? Ric was always good for a couple bags on ice in the backseat."

She snatches the flask from my hand and swallows while navigating the winding path back to the road. Not a polite little sip either. And she doesn't even flinch. Damn. I like that in a woman too. "Donated blood is for humans who need it," she says, all serious and insulted. "I'm offering. Me. Just this once. I'll consider us even. I don't like owing debts."

I know just what she means. I retrieve my flask and take a swallow.

"I appreciate the gesture," I say. "But I'll make it home. And I happen to like people owing me. I'll save it for a rainy day."

She nods. "The headstone is really beautiful," she says, abruptly changing topics. "Who'd you compel to get it done so quickly?"

"How do you know it was me? Could've been lots of people."

She gives me an annoyed look. "Ric trusted you, so I'm going to trust you too. You really don't have to act like the bad guy."

"I am bad," I correct her. "I killed him."

"I know."

"Twice. And at the time, I wasn't sorry. And then I didn't kill him when I should have."

"I know that too," she whispers.

"So actually, I am bad." I don't need her fucking permission or absolution or pity. None of it.

She takes back the flask and raises it to her lips. "Maybe we all are," she mutters so quietly I almost didn't hear her. She swallows and hands the flask back to me, and we drive in silence the rest of the way. Elena's car is in the driveway when Meredith pulls up, but there's no sign of Stefan or his motorcycle.

"Oh great." I offer Meredith the last pull in the flask.

"Need more help?" she asks.

"No. I got this one."

* * *

I can hear her tossing my room before I even open the door. I don't shut it quietly, either. I stand in the entryway and listen, and it's just Elena in the house, throwing my shit around. Books, clothes, a belt that lands with a metallic thud, a couple pairs of shoes. No sign of Stefan. Oh yeah. She's having a fun time.

I go down to the basement for a blood bag. I take a couple extra and toss them in the fridge in the kitchen 'cause I have a feeling I'm going to need them. I refill my flask in the parlor. I'm not quiet about any of this. She's so focused she didn't hear Meredith's car, didn't hear me clomping around the house, and I wear boots. I stomp up the stairs at a human pace, all but hollering her name, and she doesn't even notice me standing in the doorway less than two feet away.

What is Stefan teaching her? Sure as shit he isn't showing her how to feed properly or listen or not get ambushed. If I were the hunter, she'd be dead. For real this time. Then again, who am I to talk? I have a hole in my chest that's rather painfully knitting itself back together.

"I hope you plan on cleaning this up," I say.

She jumps and has the decency to look guilty. "I need bourbon," she lies. She's a goddamn terrible liar. "To get through Rebekah's party. Yours is better than Stefan's."

Freudian slip much, Elena? We all know mine is better than Stefan's, and not just my choice of booze.

"Hmmmm," I say, like I'm considering her request, but mostly I'm just gleaning every little detail I can from her. She's not even dressed like Elena. She exchanged hunger and grief for rage. Way to go, Stefan. Teach her to channel all that vampire emotion into rage, and she is fucking pissed. She's looks better since feeding from Matt at the memorial, a sight I don't know if I never want to see again or watch in slow-motion playback over and over. I hope she's not exclusively feeding from him, or he'll drop like a fly. Given what she doesn't know about being a vampire could maybe squeeze into the Grand Canyon, I'm going to assume she doesn't realize you can't drink more than a sip from the same person with any kind of regularity. Good job, Stefan. Killing her ex-boyfriend and childhood friend won't traumatize her at all.

"Top drawer of the dresser," I say.

"Thanks," she says. She huffs over, all indignant school girl, which I appreciate even though she pisses me off and makes me feel all worried and protective, which makes me even more pissed off because Stefan's fist reminded me it's not my place to worry about or protect her. I pull the flask from my pocket and swallow. Thank god I refilled it because this girl drives me to drink.

"You keep alcohol in your underwear drawer?" she asks disdainfully, her fingertip hooked around my most modest and unattractive pair. Then again, I usually don't wear underwear, so it's my least attended to item of clothing.

"No," I scoff. "But you weren't looking for alcohol, were you?" I unbutton my shirt.

Dammit. Another John Varvatos ruined. Two in two days. I've gone through more shirts in a year than I did in the previous fifty.

Fuck.

My un-life is ironic because if she'd actually been looking for the alcohol she claims she is, she would've found what she's looking for, and I wouldn't have to refold most of my wardrobe and repair the broken spines of several first editions.

"Do you actually think I'd leave the last remaining white oak stake where any vampire could just walk in and take it?" I ask while inspecting the healing wound. It's still tender, but give it another couple of minutes, and I'll be able to shower and get on with my plan to kill this motherfucker.

"What happened to you?" she asks in a tone that's far more annoyed than concerned. Never mind I was the one who saved her from eating the Grille. Never mind that she called me, not Stefan, and I came running, literally running, with a new dress that was better than the one she ruined in the first place. Nope. That's just Damon doing his part in the Protect Elena Gilbert Effort.

Fuck me for caring.

"Hunter mishap."

"You know he was in my school today?" She says it like it's somehow my fault.

I'm not the one pretending to be a high school student. I was actually trying to get rid of the asshole while you were taking your physics test. Blame Stefan for the lack of security. Oh right, except nothing is ever Stefan's fault. He's the good brother. And yeah, I feel fine. Thanks for the concern over the blood drying a little too close to my heart for comfort.

"Yep," I answer. "Jeremy told me."

"Why were you talking to Jeremy?" She has her hip all cocked out, in full righteous indignation mode. She looks so much like Katherine right now it's scary. I'm so pissed off I almost tell her that, just to see what happens.

"Don't worry about it." I've never let anything happen to you, Elena, and I won't let anything happen to him either. Yes, I killed him that one time. It didn't take. I said I was sorry, and I never fucking apologize, so let's move on.

"Damon, don't bring him into this."

I take off my shirt, standing far too close to her. I dare her to lick the dried blood. She wants to. I can see it in her eyes, the way her pupils dilate. She licks her lips and bites the bottom one. Her lips are all red and plump and shiny... Now _that_ would be a not depressing way to spend the rest of the day. But holy fuck this girl is the biggest cock tease ever. At least Katherine delivered.

"Perish the thought he might actually be useful, Elena?" I snark instead. I save the kid the wrath of a newborn vampire and don't tell her he's the one who called me.

I purposefully unbuckle my belt because if she is in this room for another second I will have her, because both of us desperately need it, but we can't have it, so she needs to go. Now. Yesterday. Get away from me. Except she's staring, not taking the hint. I need her to walk away. Take all that anger and get the fuck out.

"You staying for the show?" I prompt.

Since I'm not wearing underwear at the moment, it would indeed be a quite a show because my dick doesn't seem to care that I'm pissed at her and she looks like Katherine, but she's still Elena, and Elena is always technically Stefan's girl. Nope. Doesn't care at all. I'm so hard it hurts, and it just wants what it wants.

She flinches when I unsnap my pants, tearing her eyes away as she huffs out.

"I'm finding that stake," she shouts over her shoulder, forgetting she doesn't have to raise her voice anymore. I can hear just fine, and so can she.

"You go right ahead and do that," I answer conversationally.

I know you can hear me, and I hope you listened because I mean it. You can find it. I gave you a clue, Elena.

Think.

Think. Think.

You can do this, Elena. You can still be you and be a vampire. I promise. Don't let the anger consume you. Push through it. Be Elena. We spent the summer super-sleuthing for Stefan, and we've solved all kinds of mysteries and problems. This is easy: you were looking for alcohol, and I sent you somewhere I don't keep alcohol. Are you too pissed off and in a flutter over my delicates, or are you going to focus and realize the stake is where I actually do keep the alcohol? I listen as she stalls at the bottom of the stairs, still angry and overwhelmed and desperately wanting her prize.

I can tell when she gets it. The eureka moment. There's my clever girl.

She flashes to the bar in the parlor. There, in the back, wrapped in a dark cloth because the metal from Ric's ring is too fucking shiny to conceal well, that's where I put the stake. I wouldn't let just anyone have it, and now I'll have to think of a different place to keep it. The bar was so convenient because it always seems like Originals are crashing through the windows when I'm trying to enjoy a nightcap.

But I'm leaving town anyway, so it doesn't matter because it's coming with me.

I'll let her have it, for a little while at least. Like I care if Rebekah and all her vampire spawn bite the dust. Not that she'll actually do it. She _is_ still Elena, no matter how pissed off or how much she resembles Katherine right now. She'll hold it and think about it and maybe go so far as to plan how she'll pull it off. She'll think she feels better. And just maybe the illusion will be enough to satisfy her, and she'll be able to get her head out of her ass for two seconds and realize rage isn't her thing. Yeah, there's loads to be pissed off about, but speaking from experience, rage doesn't make anything better and regret follows hot on its heels.

Plus, I'll have to get it back from her before I leave. I'm not giving anyone that stake. I don't care how edible she looks dressed for school. I'm merely allowing her to borrow it for the afternoon as a public service, which means I have a reason to go to her house later. Before I leave. Not that I need a reason because she doesn't deserve a goodbye after this little stunt, but still.

The details of the plan come to me in the shower. I fucking love my shower. It's the one thing in Mystic Falls I'll miss. We need to set a trap because I can be ironic too, motherfucker. All I need are some side-kicks. I'm fresh out of the trusty ones, so un-trusty will have to do. Desperate times. I grab my phone and dial, dripping water all over the floor because I am so ready to blow this joint. Pun intended.

"Damon?" Meredith asks.

"What do you know, doc? It looks like rain."


	2. After Party

_A/N: Expanded Elena POV from 4.4 "The Five" because after that episode, the girl is in some serious need of redemption. I hope (or maybe it's wishful thinking) she'll get her chance on the show next week, but just in case the writers don't let her (and I'm impatient even if they do), here's my attempt to explain her choices. No beta this time, and it sort-of just gushed out, so the mistakes and misfortunes are all mine._

**After Party**

Dawn is another hour or so away, and before, when I was human, I would've just seen darkness. I'm glad I don't need to turn on the lights because I need these quiet minutes to myself. But my new eyes can already see morning in the east, the way the darkness isn't quite as dark over there. It's little things like that that keep startling me, hearing and seeing and feeling things so powerfully that I shouldn't even be able to perceive.

There's a few inches left in the last of Ric's bottles in the cupboard, and I sink down to the floor in the kitchen because I couldn't lay in my bed beside Stefan for another second. Thank goodness he sleeps like the dead. Which, technically, he is. And I am too, I guess.

Bllaaauuugh.

I drink straight from the bottle, and it is nasty. I don't know how they all guzzle it down like it's water. Yes, it helps with the cravings, but it tastes terrible. And it burns. Like swallowing bleach. Not that I've ever done that, although I suppose I can now if I want. Such a strange thought it's almost tempting. I mean, it won't kill me. I don't think. But all the same, I'll stick with Ric's bourbon. I suppose, if I drink enough of it, I'll get drunk, which is a really nice thought. Anything to make it stop. Just for a minute. A second. Just stop feeling so damn much all the time.

All the fucking time.

Yeah, this is a fucking moment for sure. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

FFFFFUUUUUUUUCCCCCKKKKK.

It'd be more satisfying if I screamed it as loud as I can, maybe so loud I'll tear my vocal chords or burst the blood vessels around my eyes. Scream until I run out of air in my lungs. Maybe I'll try that later, in the woods, rather than keeping it all inside my head, but if I scream now, or even just speak aloud in a normal voice, then I'll have Stefan sitting here beside me on the floor, hovering, offering me a glass for Ric's bourbon, wanting to help, assuring me that it will all be fine because I'm still here and he loves me and I love him and now we can love each other forever, and if he says my emotions are "a bit heightened" one more time, I will bite off his head.

Blllaaraughhhh.

Seriously, bourbon is disgusting. Maybe I should try something else next time. Tequila or scotch or vodka.

What does it mean that I'm still here, drinking bourbon on the kitchen floor, when I should be dead and buried next to my parents? Am I still even me? According to Caroline, who makes all this seem so easy when it is anything but, I am simply an extreme version of myself now. I suppose that kind-of makes sort-of sense, although it's ironic that I'm more me now that I'm dead than I was when I was alive. I bite my tongue until it bleeds to not laugh out loud at that absurdity. And then I just want to cry.

Bllllaaurggh.

No more crying. Breathe. I'm still me. I am Elena. I am Elena Gilbert. Extreme Elena Gilbert. I can figure this out. I will figure this out because I am me, and this is simple.

Simple.

Only it's really not simple because I don't know who I am, so how can I know what an extreme version of who I don't know looks like or does? Did I ever know who I was? Isn't that the point of growing up and learning from stupid mistakes? So I could figure out who I'm supposed to be?

The night I met Damon, which I remember now, the night Stefan pulled me instead of my parents from the car, I didn't know who I was. I wanted to be the girl Matt wanted me to be. Only that wasn't working, and I was miserable and making him miserable, which was making me even more miserable. My mom told me that trying to make everyone happy would only ensure no one was happy, especially me. She told me to be myself, but I didn't know who I was then either. Damon saw, even though he compelled me to not remember. He saw me, and he was just a stranger in the road looking for Katherine and found me instead. And then I was the lone survivor at the hospital everyone wanted to interview even though my parents were dead and no one seemed to understand that I couldn't talk about what a miracle I was. And then I was sad and trying to be strong for Jeremy and desperate to not shatter into a million pieces. And then I was Stefan's girlfriend. And then I was the doppelganger. And then I was Klaus' hybrid-making magical blood source.

Who was I that night on the bridge, the night I told Damon I cared but not enough to choose him? Who was the girl who asked her sort-of boyfriend who was maybe probably dying to rescue her ex-boyfriend first, dooming herself to die too? Was that me? Am I still that girl?

Stefan swears he didn't know Meredith had healed me with Damon's blood. He's assured me, over and over, this isn't what he wants for me. But I have my doubts. Not about his love. Never that. I know Stefan loves me. It's easier to understand how much now that I know how hard it must've been for him, to be so close to me all the time when he heard my heart pumping blood. His too-gentle caresses and hesitations used to drive me crazy, but I don't know how he didn't rip off my head. Just having Jeremy in the house is sometimes more temptation than I can handle, and I have to flee. No, at least in that department, it's been a whole new world since I turned. Stefan was holding out on me... Of course, most of the time, just as it's getting good, I either barf blood all over the place or hallucinate and see Damon instead.

Bllllaaaugh.

But why did he save Matt first, even if that's what I wanted? Was it because he thought he was dying too? That we would die together? Maybe that was his idea of being romantic?

At the time, it made a sort-of of cosmic sense to my oxygen-deprived brain: I'd already been miraculously pulled from that very water by that very vampire. It only seemed fair that it was someone else's turn, and why not Matt? He's a good guy. Just a nice, normal guy who's a good friend and tries to do the right thing. He never gets any breaks. Everything's always hard for Matt. It seemed the least I could do, to ask Stefan to get him to safety first. It's not like I had a future anyway. I couldn't get married and have kids and grow old and die with the person I loved. No, those things I wanted, those simple things I took for granted, were out of my reach even before I became a vampire. I couldn't have given the world another doppelganger. Besides, with my death would come Ric's, and I wanted to give the people I love a chance to live just in case Klaus was bluffing and he wasn't the origin of their bloodline.

It made sense, to me at least, trapped in the truck under water. But now I've had more time to think about it. If Stefan loves me like he says he does, why would he have let me die, even if it's what I wanted to do? Even if, when you think about it, it was the best possible option because it benefited the most people?

I'm not blaming Stefan. I'm the one who insisted he save Matt. And I could've died like I thought I wanted. I could've just fallen asleep in that barn, never to wake up, instead of licking blood from the filthy floor to complete the transition. It had bits of dirt and hay and who knows what else mixed with it, and I did that myself. Yes, Stefan is the one who made it available, but I'm the one who put it in my mouth. I'm just not sure I believe him when he says he didn't know about Damon's blood...

Of course it was Damon's blood in my system that left me dead-ish rather than dead-dead. It's always Damon who swoops in to save me, and now he really is under my skin, literally as well as metaphorically.

Blaugh.

Hmmm. If I drink enough, it starts to taste better. That's weird. Why didn't that work with the animal blood, or, as Damon likes to call them, the "juice boxes"? The bourbon's complicated but nice. I take another drink, holding it in my mouth this time instead of swallowing as quickly as I can. I taste subtle hints of caramel. And maybe a little bit of vanilla, although it's not sweet. There's the rich flavor of the oak barrel, sort-of like when I drink blood, and I can taste the sunshine and the dirt and the living things on the back of my tongue. It's smooth and yeah, I can drink this.

I swallow again, and I don't even make a face this time. And then another. And one more. And then one more. And then I realize the bottle is empty.

Figures. I just get to liking it, and now it's gone.

No pity parties. That's what Damon told me today. And he's right. Actually, Damon is almost always right. We don't ever give him credit for being right, but most of the time, he is. And maybe it's just as well because when I've tried to give him credit, it just makes him uncomfortable, and then he kills someone because that's how Damon deals with things that make him uncomfortable. It's quite impressive, actually, a real Herculean effort, that he's not killed anyone in a while, what with all that's been going on and what I've put him through.

Damon loves me. I know that just as surely as I know Stefan loves me. Damon loves me, but I think maybe sometimes he hates me too. Yesterday, when I was in his room, throwing around his stuff like it didn't matter, he hated me, and I deserved it. Maybe that comes in handy if you live forever. Maybe hating and hurting people before you can disappoint them is easier than trying to love and be loved by people who are always dying or leaving or choosing someone else when there's no end in sight. He hides behind his boots and leather jackets and designer shirts, uses them like a shield, all that expensive blackness and sucking puns and death jokes, all his leers and grins and innuendos and clever ways of detracting and deflecting. He does it to keep people away. To mask how soft he really is.

He uses his sexiness like a weapon too. He uses it to scare me, to make me uncomfortable and run away, which I always do. Like I did yesterday in his room when he was standing there without a shirt and hurting with dried blood way too close to his heart, and I should've just held him instead of being an angry bitch and throwing his beautiful shirts and books on the floor and stealing his stake and rushing off to a party with Stefan.

Yeah, sometimes Damon hates me, but not as much or as often as he should. Mostly, though, I think Damon hates himself.

He knows exactly how to distract me from the truth, which I can only see now that I'm alone and maybe just a little bit drunk: Damon is at my mercy. He is defenseless against me. He is laid bare and vulnerable before me. He's so easy for me to hurt. And I keep doing it. I just did again. Still. I always hurt him, and he always comes back to me for more, and what will happen when one day he comes to his senses and realizes I'm not worth all the trouble and heartache?

I shouldn't have insisted on bringing Bonnie along. Damon didn't want her there. I didn't want her there either. He did it for me. Because I asked him to. There are literally thousands of other places we could've gone for vampire lessons. But I insisted on staying close to home. On bringing Bonnie. Because she hates him. She probably hates me now too...

All Damon's trying to do is help me. Show me how to live without being miserable all the time. How to survive without hurting people. And he's a great teacher except the only person I hurt today was him.

He says he's not a ripper like Stefan because he finds the fun. And I think that's true. I think Damon actually does have fun. I think that's how he's survived all this time, all these decades alone and loving people who don't love him back. It's all the little things he makes fun. And if he can't, if he's not having fun, he tries really hard to fake like he is.

I understand that need, to fake it until you feel it. I really do.

It was supposed to be simple, the party. Him in that Jack the Ripper costume, which he can pull off with an ironic smile and wink because he's not actually a ripper. That's classic Damon. Everything's a joke. And that hat... He looked hot in the hat...

Why bother lying when it's just me, sitting alone on the kitchen floor with an empty bottle of bourbon? Damon _is_ hot. He always looks great. And it wasn't terrible. In fact, that stupid party was a raging success because not only did I not kill anyone, it was fun. I can't remember the last time I had that much fun. Or any fun at all, actually. There, in the dark, lost in the crush of an anonymous crowd, my body warm and tingling and flooded with life, I actually felt good. I danced with Damon, who's not like dancing with anyone else. Damon dances with abandon. With style and grace and ferocity, like he does everything, even at a disgusting frat party filled with mean girls and boys who were trying to drug them. I licked the blood from Damon's fingers and ground myself against his hardness, and he felt so good. I didn't feel sick and I wasn't hallucinating, and I was ready to lick the blood from his face right there on the dance floor when Bonnie showed up to glare and judge.

I ruined what should've been a successful night. It should've been something to celebrate, and really, what with the never-ending funeral and fighting-for-our-lives, we could use a few more things to celebrate. But no. I had to make sure Bonnie was there to remind me that I can't dare have fun. Because it's wrong. Wanting blood is wrong.

I know this. Elena Gilbert knows this. Except I also know blood is simple. It's the only thing that makes sense anymore. There really isn't a human comparison. Blood goes beyond pleasure. Blood is oblivion. It's beautiful, sweet, glorious oblivion. It would be so easy to lose myself in the blood, to focus on the beating heart, to forget everything else because the blood is ecstasy. Ecstasy balancing on the razor's edge of pain.

It terrifies me because I don't want to lose myself before I even know who I am. Except I know I don't have to be afraid of becoming a monster when Damon is there. That's why I took him instead of Stefan. Because I trust Damon. Because I've made him the monster when all he wants is to show me he's still a man.

I use him, over and over, and he is so patient with me, so gentle when I need it and so harsh when I need that too. He tells me the truth, not what I want to hear, which means I usually end up mad at him because who doesn't prefer the pretty lies? And like all summer, when it was just the two of us because Stefan was gone, tonight, at that party, he wanted to remind me that I can still have fun. That it's okay. That I'm okay. That I don't have to be guilty or ashamed or justify myself or explain or apologize or pretend everything is fine if it's not. With Damon, only with Damon, I can just be.

And then I reject him. Again. Still. Always. I throw his love back in his face and pick Stefan, always Stefan, and I tell Damon I don't want to be like him. Only I think maybe I am. Or maybe I could be if only I'd be brave enough to try.

When I look at it like this, sitting on the floor, clutching Ric's last empty bottle, it seems very simple, which means it's complicated as all hell. But at least now I know this: I am Elena Gilbert, and I am not cruel.


	3. Bursting Bubbles

_A/N: Expanded Damon POV from 3.1, "The Birthday." I'd intended for this to be a sudsy, fun little fic, but it refused to cooperate. Thanks to CreepingMuse for being so generous with her time and reminding me it's better to let stories be what they want to be._

* * *

**Bursting Bubbles**

I love waking up to a view, and let me tell you, Andie Starr naked in my bed is quite the uncomplicated sight. There is nothing more deliciously distracting than legs like hers, whether they're wrapped around my hips or over my shoulders or folded underneath her while she's down on her knees or spread and limp because I just fucked her senseless. Even now, standing in those heels in that tight skirt while she puts on make-up she doesn't need in my bathroom... Yeah, there is nothing confusing or conflicted about Andie's legs. And even though I can't see it, I know she's wearing my bite mark this morning under that skirt. God, I love the femoral artery – It's really hard to not drain her dry from there, with her blood racing so I don't even have to suck, my fingers deep in her pussy, those legs pressed against my face, her screaming my name. It takes a lot of effort to not kill a long-term distraction, and I should get more credit for showing excessive amounts of control instead of getting shit about how she's my fake, compelled girlfriend.

Cheers to me.

In a burst of optimism, I ordered a case of champagne from the year Elena was born, which made for quite the liquor store bill, and this from someone accustomed to drinking expensive booze. I don't like champagne, 1992 wasn't the best year for it, bubbles are so frivolous and festive, and you have to drink too much of it to feel the buzz. But it's Elena's 18th birthday, and despite all that's going so proverbial hell-in-a-hand-basket wrong, I feel like being grateful to the universe today.

"We are out of champagne," I say as I pour a final swallow into my glass.

"No," Andie corrects as she puts on her make-up. "_You_ are out of champagne. I don't drink in the morning." Of course not. She's a professional, that Andie Starr.

"Well, would you be a dear and..."

"I think you can get it yourself," she interrupts. "I'm not your slave."

Oh, it'd be so easy to turn her into one, if I were so inclined. But Andie... well... there's more to us than that. She's everything I appreciate in a woman: smart, snappy, feisty, gorgeous, confident, assertive, fun, legs from here to Sunday. I love that she's actually a woman, a fully grown woman, which is a nice change considering I spend most of my time with melodramatic teenagers and all their angst and indecision. Me and Ric, the world's worst babysitting duo, trapped in high school hell.

And the truth is, I don't compel Andie much. Contrary to popular opinion, puppets don't amuse me. They have their uses, sure, at the right time and place, but they're boring and predictable. I just did the usual: "Don't tell anyone I'm a vampire," "Don't be afraid," "Hide the bite marks." Come on, the scarf is jaunty as all hell. It suits her. But that's not so much compulsion, really. Yeah, Andie's something, without any of the complications or confusion or conflicted feelings that seem to define my other relationships.

I'm considering splashing some bubbles her way, not enough to ruin all her efforts to get ready, just enough to tempt her into being the tiniest bit late for work, when I hear Elena's car pull into the drive.

Fuck.

She's not supposed to be here for a couple more hours to get ready for the party. Caroline insisted we have one even though no one wants to. Sure Caroline, a party will make Elena forget about Stefan, and just what I want is a house full of horny teenagers dry-humping all over my stuff.

But if Elena's here already, that means Liz went behind my back despite our little chat. Again. Which means Elena's not thinking about how miraculous it is that she lived to see her 18th birthday, a not-so-small a gift courtesy of Uncle-Daddy John. I won't pretend I'm sorry to see that asshole gone, but I was surprised when he traded his life for hers. But I bet she's not thinking about that, or any of the other miseries she survived to get to see this day. Nope, I'd wager the rest of that champagne she's hot-to-trot with another lead, which means instead of enjoying my bubbles, I have to haul ass to cover up a gruesome crime scene and then lie to her about it. Goddammit, Liz. Am I the only person alive who can say no to Elena Gilbert?

It's her fucking birthday.

I stand up, water splashing, and let Andie pretend like she's annoyed while she enjoys the view of me wearing nothing but bubbles in the mirror. It's hard to lie to a vampire, what with my ability to hear the way her heart rate increases, the way she sucks in her breath, smell the glorious scent of her arousal. Yeah. Pretend away. Like we both don't know perfectly well how hot I am.

It's not cocky if it's true.

"You're dripping a little," Andie says as I walk out of my bedroom, not bothering with a towel.

"Uh-huh," I agree. The sound of Andie laughing, with all the implied sexy simplicity, follows me down the hall and downstairs.

What is it with Elena and not knocking? Yes, technically the house still belongs to her, fat lot of good that does us since she died and no longer keeps out other vampires, and she has a key. But still. When Elena barges in, which she does all the time, all I can see how she sees me. Her eyes aren't windows – they're mirrors. And that fucking terrifies me.

But if I'm really good, I can get her to laugh. God, I love her laugh. And when she laughs, she forgets, just for a moment, how everything's gone to shit. When she laughs, she makes me forget too. What Stefan gave up to save me. That he left her, his shot at a second chance, in my care even though he knows I love her too. Maybe only because he knows I love her too. That he chose me over her, over himself. That we've spent our un-dead lives fighting and tormenting and threatening to kill each other, but when push came to fucking shove, he picked me.

So yeah. I live for when she laughs, which is why I'm standing here in my front entryway wearing bubbles. To make her laugh. Or, failing that, maybe just to scare her away because she's forever too close and too far away, all at the same time. I don't fucking know. I don't have any answers. Like her, I'm just holding onto the fragile hope that Stefan's salvageable, that for all the bodies I've covered up in the past two months, he's not completely lost.

"Morning," I say, hands on my hips so my best assets are front and center.

"Hey, I was going to..."

She doesn't laugh. She is open-mouthed, wide-eyed staring before she turns around, her heart pounding, her breath caught somewhere in her chest before whooshing out all at once.

"You heard me," she accuses, her angry voice deflecting from the fact that she obviously appreciates a nice view in a morning too. "You knew I was here."

"You should learn to knock," I say. "What if I was... indecent?"

She tosses me the blanket she likes, the soft red one. She turns around, but her hand is covering her eyes, as if just keeping them closed would be too much for her. But no laugh. She is all business this morning, with her little slip of paper from Liz in the pocket of her shorts.

"Memphis," she says, still not looking at me.

"Another dead end, you mean," I say. Whether or not it's a good tip, it's still a dead end. Elena keeps saying all she wants is a sign that Klaus hasn't killed Stefan. Yeah, I've seen the signs: severed heads and arms and legs ripped from their sockets and then smashed back together in a grotesque display of guilt. Trust me, Elena, you don't want a sign –

"You don't know that," she insists.

"You're right, Elena. This could be the one. After almost two months, this could be the clue that tells us Stefan is alive and well and living in Graceland."

"It's a new lead, Damon. We haven't had one in a while..."

Oh, Elena. It's your birthday. Take a break. I need a break. I'm only one person, and not a person used to being counted on. Which is why I need quite possibly the world's most perfect distraction. Andie doesn't depend on me. I don't have to lie to Andie about where I've been or what I'm doing. Andie doesn't expect me to wake up with her in the morning and pretend like I didn't sleep with her all night. Nope. Andie is the only simple thing I've got going right now. She's perfectly fine not hearing from me for a couple of days, and then I'll show up to the studio, unannounced and uninvited, and fuck her on the news desk, her skirt pushed up around her hips and me still fully clothed. Or mornings like this, too few and far between, when I get to be her trusty alarm clock and wake her up starting with her toes, just little licks and sucks and nibbles with dull teeth, and work my way up. By the time I'm at the backs of her knees, completely overlooked and under-appreciated by most people, she's not laughing and swatting me away and begging for just five more minutes. Oh, she's begging, but not for more sleep. Her fingers are in my hair and she's yanking and trying to get me to hurry. But I like to settle myself in, get nice and comfortable. I fucking need it, and Andie lets me distract myself as often as I want without explanations or apologies or guilt.

Simple. Everything Elena isn't.

"There's coffee," I say after I snatch back her precious little scrap of Stefan news and call her bluff on going to investigate herself. Even she's not _that _self-destructive. Leave the stupidity and life-risking and body-burning to me. "Be down in a minute."

"Damon," she starts up the stairs after me.

"Going to help me rinse off?" I interrupt, standing so close to her that the softness of her top brushes against my bare chest. Yeah, I make her nervous, which I really need sometimes. For her to get embarrassed and skittish and run away, clutching her offended virtue and covering her scandalized, little-girl eyes.

Her in my room is bad on so many levels. The last time she was in here, she told me she liked me just the way I was. She promised me that I wouldn't die alone. She kissed me. None of which we've ever talked about. An entire summer spent together, and we've gone out of our way to avoid my room and the things that happened in there, and that's just one more thing we pretend doesn't happen. And Andie's in my bathroom getting ready for work. My sheets reek of sex and are stained with blood. There's no reason for Elena to be uncomfortable about such practicalities of two grown-ups who are... whatever Andie and I are. Andie is kind to Elena, but Elena is always awkward and tense around Andie, even without evidence of last night's sexcapades in full view. And my crime-scene-central is hidden in here.

"Moved onto Tennessee," I tell Andie when I pin the new lead onto the map on my closet door.

"Really?" she says. "That Florida victim had family in Tennessee."

Andie kisses me goodbye and promises to text me an address. Thank Christ people talk to reporters because compulsion doesn't work over the phone. She has saved me so much time and effort and miles on the Camaro. She really is the most fucking perfect distraction.

I dial Ric: "Field trip. You're driving. Pick me up in 30 minutes."

Ric gets all protective with Elena, scowling at me and muttering warnings under his breath that only I can hear, which is rich given that he seems fine with her being in love with Stefan, who's off earning his decapitation merit badge at Klaus' exclusive summer camp. The whole paternal thing is actually really good for him even though it pisses me off, but I'd never say that because he and I don't fuck with each other's heads like that.

When Jeremy's working the night shift at the Grille, which means Ric is drinking at the bar, waiting for them to close so he can bring Jeremy safely home, Elena falls asleep over here. We watch movies or play cards and eat popcorn and pretend like nothing's wrong. She wears Stefan's shirts those nights, unbuttoned over her little tank tops, her hands lost in too-long sleeves. Even though I live alone in a house full of bedrooms, she sleeps on the sofa, which means I do too. I understand why Ric keeps sleeping on their couch when he could have a comfortable bed upstairs. Not that I tell him that, but I really do get it. Sometimes just admitting there's an empty bed is more than a person can bear.

She'll wake up suddenly, heart pounding and gasping for air and trying to run from her nightmares. Except you can't run from yourself. Trust me, I've tried. Elena doesn't say anything when I spoon her against me on the sofa, fully clothed and still wearing my boots. She nuzzles into my chest while I stroke her hair and hum the songs my mother used to sing to me when I was a little boy. I soothe her back to sleep, and I hold her for the rest of the night, scaring away the bad dreams, only easing her back onto the pillows as she's starting to wake up in the morning. She opens her eyes to find me sprawled in a chair with an open book or in the kitchen brewing coffee.

We pretend like it doesn't matter. Like it never happened.

She's not even halfway through her first mug of coffee when I'm back downstairs, rinsed and dressed with my hair only a little bit wet. "Breakfast," I say as I pull out pans and open the fridge. It's not a question. She's too thin, doesn't eat enough, doesn't sleep enough. And yes, I cook. It seems like all I've done this summer. Ric is fine with take-out every night, but there are only so many options in Mystic Falls. It gets old. How often can you eat Chinese or pizza or cold burgers Jeremy brings home from the Grille? Jeremy should've asked for a job in the kitchen, maybe learn some skills along with the horror of earning minimum wage. Elena tried at first, but good Christ. She's just as likely to chop her fingers as anything else. I like that she "helps," which mostly means she's leaning against the counter and standing in the way. Fine by me. Sometimes, when I can tell she's having a rough day, I let her do the onions, even though she leaves them in big fucking chunks. It gives her an excuse to cry a little, and I pretend like yes, indeed, what a strangely strong onion.

I slice a banana and toss some blueberries into Greek yogurt because I'm all about balanced diets and moderation these days and slide it over to her while the water boils for her egg. She doesn't even blink, just picks up the spoon and takes my fixing her breakfast for granted, that's how often it happens. Look at me: Damon, the domesticated vampire. Who'd have thought I had it in me? Not me, that's for sure.

Andie says love changes us, that I've changed because of Elena. I don't know about that. But god, that first night I slipped into Elena's room, breathing in her scent and looking at all her girly things... Just a couple hours before, in her kitchen, she shocked the shit out of me, and I'm not easily surprised because I've pretty much seen it all. Yeah, the resemblance to Katherine was freaky as fuck, but that night, she was the first person, ever, to acknowledge that I'd lost Katherine too. Not just Stefan. Me. Here was this girl, this little girl who still slept with a stuffed bear for fuck's sake, and she didn't care that she didn't know me and I'd done nothing but make her uncomfortable and jealous and Stefan grouchy, and she truly felt for me because I loved someone who was gone. Who does that? Who feels that much for strangers? Who is this girl?

It's still confusing. And despite the fact that technically and legally Elena is now an adult, she really is just a girl who likes her eggs poached with buttered toast cut into tiny strips, which she systematically dips into the yolk. She's so used to being loved and cared for that she can't even cook her own eggs, and now I'm the only one who's here to make them for her.

"Mmmmm," she murmurs, taking a bite. "Perfect. I don't know how you do that, with the swirling water. My mom used a special pan." She's completely ignoring the fact that ten minutes ago, she saw me wearing my birthday suit.

"Years of practice," I say.

I open a second bottle of chilled champagne and pour two glasses. I decide it's better not to tell her it's her very own glass of birthday frivolity, since I was forbidden to buy her anything, and neither of us is feeling festive. "It's not a cake," I apologize. "But Caroline would kill me if you made your wish without her presiding over it."

I pretend I don't know what her birthday wish is. All she wants is what she can't have. Join the crowd, Elena. Welcome to adulthood, where, if you're lucky enough to know what you want, you get to live with the fact that you're never going to get what your heart most desires.

Yeah, I should've gone with bourbon because champagne doesn't even begin to take the edge off of the fact that I'm not doing a damn thing but trying not to burst all her hopeful little girl bubbles.

I gently clink my glass against hers. "Happy birthday, Elena."

* * *

_Author's Post Script: Yes, gentle (and astute) readers, in my version of events, Stefan knicks Damon's birthday champagne to "celebrate" Elena's barfed deer blood hunting expedition in 4.2, "The Memorial." According to my web research (and hey, if it's on the internet, it has to be true, right?), 1992 wasn't the best year for champagne, but even still, a bottle will run you $300 and up. Not something to just have laying around, even in a house filled with undisclosed treasures like the Salvatore Boarding House. And with all the events that precede it's appearance in S4, I can't see Stefan wandering over to the liquor store and special-ordering a bottle. Since Damon in the bathtub on Elena's birthday is the only other time in recent events we've seen champagne (with the exception of the blood-spiked, spelled champagne at the Mikealson Ball), I decided to have Damon be the one to buy it. Please feel free to share a better theory if you don't like mine._


	4. Litany of Broken Hearts

_A/N: I'm breaking my own self-imposed rule for this one, since Stefan and Damon aren't day-drinking. Expanded POV from "The Killer." I have no idea what time it is when this conversation takes place, only that it's still dark outside Stefan's windows. But I assume this is only the beginning of the drinking, that it'll continue in solitude for many more hours, probably until dawn. So I'm slipping this chapter in on a technicality and loop-hole. Thanks, always and eternally, to CreepingMuse._

* * *

**Litany of Broken Hearts**

Stefan is in the shower when I gulp the rest of my drink and pour another because there isn't enough bourbon on the planet after a day like today, and plunging into Stefan's psyche isn't my idea of a good time.

Six fucking locks, including the last one which shouldn't fucking count because it was a tiny little-girl diary lock. Pathetic. Paranoid much, little brother? Like any number of locks would keep me out. And who else would bother to read your journals, asshole, tedious as they are?

He thinks I get off on invading his privacy. He thinks I do it just to piss him off. I'll admit that is a fun bonus, but mostly I subject myself to my brother's maudlin musings because I can't always trust what he says out loud, even when I literally squeeze the truth from his deceptive little heart. But the thing with Stefan is that he's been scribbling in his journals since he was a kid, and even though I know Stefan better than anyone, I have no idea whether or not he believes his own bullshit. Why write it down for posterity if he doesn't think it's true? But maybe writing down some altered version of reality makes it easier to revise history on the back-end.

I don't fucking know how unreliable his version of the story is. And even scarier, I don't think he knows either. But over the years, in addition to unburdening his soul of appallingly boring accounts of his various levels of guilt and depression, he has committed to paper some fucking egregious lies.

_She's been spiraling since her transition. There are times I barely recognize her. But now, for the first time in a while, there's hope. Somewhere in the world, there's a cure for vampires. If I can get it, Elena can be human again. I can give her back her life. So that's what I need to do. No matter what Klaus asks. No matter what lies I have to tell or secrets I have to keep. I'll do it. No matter what it takes._

Fucking Stefan and his unapologetic melodrama. I'd hide that shit if I'd written it too. But funny we used the same word to describe her today: spiral. At least I had the goddamn guts to say it to her face. But it's the "no matter what it takes" part that worries me. Fuck. Stefan's old friend, the slippery slope of rationalization. Even at the height of his ripping, when he's not supposed to give a shit about anything because he's busy swimming in a sea of blood, he has to justify it. Manipulate the facts and lie and write it all down so he can read back over it and not be crushed by the weight of all the bodies.

He didn't bear witness to my first kill, and I never told him about it. I never told anyone. I was human, and it happened in the heat of battle. Maybe I'd killed someone before, when we'd been ordered to fire on the Union line. I don't know. But the first person I saw die at my hands was a boy, just a boy about the same age as Stefan. I didn't have anything against him, but it was kill or be killed. I plunged my bayonet into his chest. It was both harder and easier than I thought it would be. And he fell to his knees before me, blood bubbling out of his mouth as he looked at me with wide, shocked eyes, and all I wanted was to take it back. Take it all back, even if it meant I would die instead, for this stranger who was doing his best to kill me. He tried to say something that got lost in all the blood, and I watched the life drain from his eyes. He was dead, and my bayonet was still buried in his chest, and I knew I had to keep moving, keep killing. I couldn't stop, not ever again.

I stabbed another. And then a third. I had a chance to reload and shoot the fourth before I bayoneted the fifth and the sixth, and I ended the battle shooting the seventh in the back as he tried to run. I did it all with tears in my eyes, and after that first battle, I stopped counting.

I'm not Stefan. I don't keep fucking lists. And what does that say about my metaphorical heart? Is it pure? I heard Emily Bennett tell Stefan his heart was pure even though she'd made her deal for the lives of her children with me. Was I a beast before I met Katherine and didn't require compulsion to stay in love with a vampire? Was I already a monster when my father shot me for the unforgivable crime of following my fucking heart?

That's what she did today. Elena. She followed her heart. It doesn't matter that it's no longer beating because she is still Elena, and she loves. Goddamn, but I've never known anyone who loves like that girl. She was ready to go in there today, guns a' blazin', not because she's a monster, but because she's not. Elena is not a damsel, and she's never been one for sitting out fights, even before her training with Ric. She was going to save her brother. She has no sense of her own self-preservation, but nothing stops her from rushing into harm's way for the people she loves. And there's no one, not me or Stefan or anyone, she loves more than Jeremy.

I know that feeling. I know what it's like to want so desperately to save a little brother. To be willing to risk anything, everything, to keep him safe and maybe even a little bit innocent. To hold onto your sanity with the fragile hope that somehow, somewhere, he's okay, no matter what it costs to keep him that way.

Yeah. I know just what that feels like.

Elena doesn't want to admit it, and I wish like hell it didn't have to be this way, but she is so much like me it's fucking tragic. She is like me, and her going in there was the best option. It's what I wanted to do, what I eventually found a way to do. I put two and two together, and that equaled Stefan double-crossing us again. I couldn't trust him, and I was drugged and weak and had to get across the street without my ring. And Elena couldn't lose Jeremy.

Connor was mortal; Jeremy's ring was useless against him. And she was so sure of herself when she told me she was dangerous, that she was every bit the monster she needed to be for her little brother. She threw me to the bed and straddled me, her thighs strong against my own when she pinned me and aimed the crossbow at my heart. Yeah, Ric did his job well.

Except she's still Elena, no matter how well she can shoot stakes or snap necks or dig graves. How can Stefan not see that? How can he not recognize the girl we both love?

I don't know what happened because Elena's not talking, but I know she didn't want to kill him. Connor left her no choice. Judging by the bloody tear in her shirt and the staggering amount of blood left spoiling in his cooling body, she didn't kill him in a hunger-fueled rage. I don't even think Elena would kill in self-defense. She snapped Connor's neck in Jeremy's defense. He tried to stake her, and he missed, which is weird in of itself because that was not a man who missed. But he did, and Elena took advantage because he was never going to stop until all of us were dead. It was fast and painless and better than that sadistic fuck deserved.

According to Stefan's heart-felt confession, every twisted and not-funny pun intended, and now backed up by his journal, he believes there is a cure for vampirism, whatever the hell that means, and now the only way to find it is dead. But there in the woods, with his blood drying on her chin, she wept for this man who was trying to kill her, trying to kill her brother and her friends. She was crying for him, but I know she was crying for herself too.

Elena didn't realize she'd killed her maybe chance to have her human life back, but even if he'd had this elusive cure in his pocket and magically she'd be human again, it wouldn't change a goddamn thing because there was a man who died at her hands and she was burying him in the woods. She looked into his eyes and she killed him. She did just what I told her to do, what she knew had to be done: she got close, and she killed him. She doesn't feel like the hero who saved the day even though she is and she did because all she sees right now is Connor's lifeless eyes.

She killed him. And in all the ways that matter, she killed part of herself along with him.

Stefan doesn't recognize her. He wants to save her, and I would laugh at the insanity of the idea that he thinks he can except it is so fucking delusional.

Fucking Stefan.

"How is she?" I ask when he wanders out from his bathroom, drying his hair. It's not really a question because I've been in her shoes, and there's not a goddamn place in the world worse than where she is right now, but it's something to say to start this fucking conversation that needs to be had.

"Angry. Full of guilt. Hasn't said a word to me other than she wants to be left alone."

And you're a fucking idiot for leaving her by herself, Stefan. Even if she's pissed at him, and rightfully so because he's a lying, scheming bastard, he should be sitting on her porch just in case she changes her mind. His ass should be going numb on her front steps instead of being here, all clean and pouring himself a goddamn drink and chatting it up with me.

I want, more than anything, to climb through her window and crawl into her bed and hold her against me like I did all summer, when Stefan was gone. I want to soak up her tears and whisper all the ways she did the right thing, the only thing. I want to tell her about that boy on the battlefield. She's not in a place to listen right now, but I want to tell her she did what she had to do to protect the people she loves, and even though her heart in breaking, it is tougher than it seems because she will survive this.

Only I can't. She's alone, like I was alone that terrible night so long ago when I cried silent tears for the first person I killed, for the part of me that died on that battlefield too. And I get that she's going to feel alone right now no matter who's with her, but the only person who can maybe make her not so alone is standing in front of me all indignant that I read his precious journal.

"Thanks for not saying anything to Elena," he quietly says.

"About what? A cure we don't have, can't find, and probably doesn't exist? You're welcome."

"She doesn't need to know she killed her chance of being human again."

Oh Stefan. That little detail couldn't possibly make her feel any worse than she does right now, even if it's true. Which we don't know. I fucking hate magic. But he believes it. He really does. That he can save her. My brother, the fucking hero, who's going to get them both killed by making proverbial deals with the devil for magical cures that may or may not exist and won't change a goddamn thing if they do.

Stefan is stupid enough to make her human again, and Klaus is in on this plan because he'll have his doppelganger blood for hybrid-production. Apparently Stefan thinks Klaus is going to leave them alone so they can live happily ever after until she dies. At best, the very fucking best case scenario, Elena gets to live her human life a nicely kept and protected pet who's forced to donate blood every eight weeks. Maybe he'll let Stefan stick around and play house with her, but Klaus will make sure she has some kids to continue the bloodline, and he'll drain every last drop from her when he thinks she's no longer of use to him, and then he'll track her descendants for 500 years until the next doppelganger turns up and history can tragically repeat itself. Great fucking plan.

"Sure Stefan, since you asked, I'd be happy to go on a suicide mission with you for a potentially non-existent cure. No problem." He has the balls to think I'm joking, to laugh even though this is as serious as it gets and neither one of us is amused.

"Yet a couple hours ago you were ready to rip out my heart."

"'Cause you were being a pain in the ass."

For all the times Stefan and I have stabbed and bloodied and broken each other, for all the times we threatened and plotted and came so fucking close to ending it once and for all, today was the only time I didn't know whether or not I could actually do it. Thank Christ he spilled his treacherous little guts because I honestly don't know if I would or would not have killed him.

I literally held it in my hand today: his life, his heart. My own heart. The organ has weight to it. Substance. It's strong and doesn't crush as easily as you'd expect. The other heart, the one we feel in our chest even though it's actually somewhere in our head, couldn't be more different. It's layers upon layers of transparently thin wet tissue, irreparably bound. Far too fragile to repair, the more you try and fix it, the more damage you cause, and you end up with a disintegrating glob of uselessness that doesn't even remotely resemble what it once did.

"Answer me one thing," I say. "Why do you want to cure her?"

"What kind of question is that?"

"Legitimate one. You want to cure her because she's a vampire and she's not cut out to be? Or because you can't love her if she is one?"

He has the decency to not answer right away. And in that hesitation, the truth is abundantly clear. My brother hates himself so much that he can't be in love with her if she's anything like him. He doesn't recognize her anymore because he's blinded by his own self-loathing. He will love his memory of human Elena, the Elena who exists only in his journals, but not the girl right in front of him.

"I'll always love her," he finally says. "But she's not supposed to be this person, and I don't want her to be."

Oh Stefan. It's so often quoted that it's become a cliché, that the opposite of love is not hate, but apathy. Stefan and I have never been apathetic. There were years, entire decades even, when we were purposefully avoiding each other, and other times when we were both doing our best to annoy and otherwise torment the other to proverbial if not literal death. Perhaps there were threats and the occasional vervaining and imprisoning and killing important people to send messages that never fucking got through. But through it all, as angry as I get at him, for all the times I hate his fucking guts and want nothing more than to beat him to a bloody, unrecognizable pulp, it's actually quite simple. I love my brother like I love Elena. Unconditionally. Something he can't seem to understand.

"Well, if I'm going to ride this fairy tale to its conclusion, I want to be clear about one thing: I'm fine with her either way, brother. I'm doing this for you."


	5. Fleeting Figments and Steady Hands

_A/N: Expanded Elena POV from 4.6, "We All Go A Little Mad Sometimes," 'cause there's nothing I love more than character development. I spent the day typing with a sick kiddo on my lap (who frequently blew his nose in my hair), so playing with imaginary friends was extra escapist fun. I hope y'all enjoy too. Thanks to CreepingMuse for a speedy turn-around and always solid advice. *cue Florence and the Machine*_

* * *

**Fleeting Figments and Steady Hands**

Of course it was his hands that saved me. Damon's hands. The only thing that's felt real this week, since this mess that is my life got even messier when I died. My fangs sunk in his palm, the spicy but sweet tang of his blood tingling my tongue, filling me with unspoken heat and desire. A dress hooked so casually over his finger as he passed it to me through the door, saving me in every sense of the word with such nonchalance. When we danced at that frat party, the heady intoxication of sucking human blood from his fingers, the way he ground into me and moaned into my hair when my tongue swirled his fingertips long after they were clean. His arm around my waist, there, in the murky water, as he held me tightly against his chest, shielding me from the rising sun with his body as he searched the muddy river bottom one-handed for my ring.

I know those were his hands, too, in the shower, his own shirt and jeans sodden as he stripped me and held me under the hot spray and washed away the stink of that water where I was supposed to die. Where I did die. Where I was miraculously saved. Again. He was gentle but thorough as he lathered and rinsed and then toweled me dry. Dressed me in clean clothes without so much as a leer or smirk or comment. His hands carefully combed out the tangles from my hair before they tucked me into bed with my bear.

I drifted off, not asleep but not fully awake, but I could hear him, raiding Ric's closet in the next room and taking his own turn in my shower. I remember thinking fleeting of joining him, of returning the favor, of the way the water would look running down his chest, but I couldn't move.

Oddly, I worried that our latest adventure ruined his boots and his phone. At the rate he goes through phones, I hope he's bought stock. At least he wasn't wearing his leather jacket that is so very Damon. That seemed important, at the time, to note that his jacket was safe.

I wanted, more than anything, to sleep, but I couldn't, not really, until I heard him come back into my room, smelling oddly of my shampoo and Ric's clothes. He ran a gentle hand over my forehead, my cheek, my bottom lip, his touch so soft I'm not sure I would've felt it when I was a human. I tried to open my eyes to stop him when I thought he was saying goodbye, leaving me, but then he walked over to the window seat and cracked open the seal on a new bottle of bourbon. He didn't bother with a glass, just drank in greedy swallows like I did on the kitchen floor, when I made the vow to myself to figure out who I was first and foremost by no longer being cruel.

It feels like an eternity ago.

When I realized he would stay, stand guard over my sleep like he did all summer, I finally let go and allowed the darkness to swallow me. I didn't dream. For the first time since I woke up on that cold metal table in the hospital basement, I didn't dream when I closed my eyes. I just slept. Unhaunted. Uninterrupted. I don't know how long I was asleep, but I feel like a new person. It could've been whole days. Weeks. Maybe even a month. Or maybe only an hour. A minute. A second. Strange, now that I'm timeless, I really do have no sense of it. I understand, maybe, possibly, how Damon waited for Katherine for a hundred and forty-five years, how he didn't stop loving her because that would feel like both nothing and forever, all at the same time.

My ring. It's back on my finger. And my hand is warm from resting in the sun. Not burning like before, the pain of thousands of tiny fires erupting along my skin as the weak morning sun rose over the horizon. The contrast is like Damon himself. He can be so dangerous, killing with deadly precision and careless ferocity. He is a predator, but he's my protector too.

Of course it was Damon who found me on Wickery Bridge, trying to do what had failed twice before. I was going to die, and it was going to be for real this time. Dead-dead. Even I didn't know where I was going after I stabbed Stefan and fled Klaus' mansion, but Damon knew where to find me because Damon was right, as always: I am like him.

"Little tip? Vampires hate to swim." He whispers it like a joke. Like a secret, only not the kind that kills or hurts people, but the kind that makes you feel special. "How you feeling?"

"My head is clear," I say. "I can remember everything, but not like I lived it. Like it was a really bad dream." It reminds me of when I was seven and had a high fever that landed me in the hospital. During those days, my mom's cool hand on my forehead was my only anchor in a world swirled with colors and voices and visions. She was the only thing I knew for certain was real.

"Hmm," he murmurs, like he's not sure whether or not to believe me. I don't blame him. I don't know whether or not I can believe me either.

"You saved me." I'm not surprised. Of course Damon saved me. He looks surprised, but I don't know why. That I said it aloud? That I acknowledged something that mattered when he and I are so good at pretending nothing between us ever does? "Thank you."

Damon looks away from me, probably because he can't accept gratitude or kindness. I'm part of the reason for that. I know this. It's not all my fault, but partly. He isn't afraid of Hunters or Originals or a witch who could kill him with her mind, but he shrinks from my gratitude like it's the most terrifying thing in the world. Maybe it is.

"Well, you know what they say about teenage suicide?" He stands up and walks over to my bed, his tone gently chiding and teasing, the very opposite of the sincerity I meant to convey. "Don't do it."

"I just can't believe I almost..." I shudder at the thought of all the many things that could've gone irreversibly wrong, had he not known where I was, had he not plunged us both into the same water that tried to kill me twice and succeeded once, only today it helped save me until Damon found my ring. I have the distinct feeling he'd have stayed under water all day, protecting me from the sun, if that's what it had taken.

"You weren't yourself," he interrupts. He drops his hand close to mine on the duvet. It's so close, and yet unbearably far away. It's Denver all over again, when he shared his darkest secret in that dingy motel, the terrible crime of loving people too much to ever want to disappoint them the way he's been disappointed, before closing that gap between our hands that had felt so unbreachable.

"Yes, but if it wasn't for you..." I grasp his hand, my turn to close the tiny and expansive distance between us. My voice trails off because I can't think about dying or anything else. I can only think about how good it feels to hold Damon's hand, how it doesn't feel cool like it used to. It's just the right temperature. He caresses his thumb against mine without breaking his grip, and I realize that I never want him to let go. Not ever again.

"Ohhhh..." he sighs. When I look up from our hands, he is staring at me, those eyes of his, too blue and too intense, looking pained but resolved. "I am about to take a very high and annoying road and tell you something." He pulls his hand away from mine, and I suddenly feel exposed and empty. "Because I know that you think Stefan has been lying to you... which... yeah... he has. But this rough patch you two have been going through is not what you think. Everything he's been doing, he's been doing for you. To help you. And after he kills me for telling you this, I want you to throw my ashes off Wickery Bridge. Okay?"

I laugh, just a little. Smile despite how terrible everything is and has been and probably will be for some time to come. Damon can always make me smile, even when I'm bracing myself for a bombshell. This definitely feels like a bombshell, and honestly, there've been enough of them in the past year to last several human lifetimes. But he's going to tell me the truth. Because I can trust Damon. He tells me the truth even when he knows it'll make me mad. Even when it's in his best interest not to. That night on the porch, when he compelled Jeremy to leave, when we kissed when we were both sober and no one was dying, he told me that Stefan was doing the right things. That he hadn't betrayed us. He loves Stefan, even though they fight and threaten and occasionally stab each other. That's the thing with Damon. He doesn't love very many people, but the ones he does, he loves them so completely. So intently and intensely and selflessly, even if it means he's left behind.

"There may be a way out of this for you, Elena. There may be a cure."

He's serious, and I know I shouldn't laugh because I want him to understand that I mean it, that I'm so grateful, that I want to be here, now, in this moment with him, and laughing is just wrong. But I do anyway. It bursts out of me even as a couple of treacherous tears roll down my cheeks because it is both the most miraculous and most absurd thing I've ever heard. I could go back to being just me. Just Elena Gilbert instead of this Extreme Elena Gilbert I don't know or understand.

"A cure?" I manage to get out between laughs and maybe probably sobs and gasps for air my lungs can't seem to remember they really don't need anymore.

He rolls his eyes at me and retrieves the bottle of bourbon he'd left on the window seat. This time, when he sits down, he settles next to me, our shoulders barely touching as he hands it over and I take a pull.

"Bbblllaaaugh," I shudder, but swallow again anyway. I pass it back to him.

"Amateur," he teases.

"I thought I finished off the last of Ric's bourbon a couple nights ago."

"I know Ric's hiding places better than you do. He has bottles stashed everywhere. I bet you went for the obvious one in the kitchen." I nod. "Drinking alone is a bad sign, you know."

"Sign of what?" I ask, taking another swallow, this time managing without sound effects or grimaces. Damon nods his approval.

"That you're on all sorts of paths that surely lead to hell."

"You drink alone all the time."

"Exactly," he says. "Which means I know what I'm talking about."

We pass the bottle between us, quiet except for the sound of swallowing and liquid sloshing, the silence oddly comforting. He called this most recent issue with Stefan a "rough patch." Is that what this is? When has it ever been anything but rough? Stefan's been so strong for me through all this, and I was certain, that night I thought they were all dying, that Stefan was the one. That I would love him, always him, forever. And that was a week ago. Just a week. But lifetimes had passed since then, and forever doesn't mean what it used to. Before that, before the ultimatum forced in a moment of dire necessity, I didn't know who or what I wanted. I didn't know if I could ever trust him again. I still don't know.

"What does it even mean?" I finally ask. "A cure?"

Damon shrugs his shoulders, the movement brushing his bare arm against mine. My entire body shivers with the slight touch, and when he moves away from me, I move so our skin is once again connected, and he leaves it this time, but I don't know if it's because he's out of room to get away or if he wants to feel me too. Does he feel that? Does his whole body tingle with just the slightest of touches?

"Wouldn't taking away a vampire's... vampirism..." I glance at him and raise my eyebrow in question. "Am I making up words?"

"Go to school more often or crack a book and you would know."

I roll my eyes at him. "Wouldn't that just leave us dead? I mean, we died. All of us..." My voice trails off, and Damon doesn't rush me. "We're dead."

"Technically, yes. We're dead."

He takes another pull on the bottle before passing it back to me. This time, when I put my lips on it, I know that they're where his just were. I run the tip of my tongue around the edge, once, then twice, the glass not as smooth as I would've thought it'd be.

"We don't know anything," he says, sounding angry. "As usual."

"You knew how to save me," I whisper. I try to block out the vision of my mom, smiling as she told me I'd be better, Jeremy would be better, if I died. Really died and stayed dead this time. She was voicing the fears and uncertainties I've been feeling myself. That they all died because of me, starting that first terrible night on that bridge, when she and my dad weren't supposed to be there. But here, clean and warm and safe in my bed with Damon beside me, I realize my mom would never say that. She never would think that. She may have been taught to hate vampires, but she loved me. Would always and will always love me. But that doesn't make her words less true.

"Team effort," Damon easily deflects.

"But how did you make them stop? They were there, all of them, so clear. Clearer than real people. On top of real people. And they all made such perfect sense. And then they were just gone. What did you do?"

"Them?"

"Connor. Katherine. My mom. They were all..." I shake my head and take another drink instead of finishing. Damon doesn't need to know how they all tried to convince me to kill myself. Connor being the most obvious, with the bloody wound on his neck even though I didn't drain him, even though I snapped his neck. He reminded me that I'm a monster who not only kills, but likes it. Katherine reminded me that I was more like her than I've ever wanted to be. And my mom... A reminder of all the people who've stood between me and danger, all the lives that have been forever changed because somehow they all thought I was worth saving.

"Katherine?" As if he understands I'm not going to finish or answer, he takes the bottle back and swallows again. "It's complicated, Elena."

"When isn't it, Damon? Please tell me. I need to know."

"Not now. Right now you need to rest. And then feed. And then we'll deal with... well... After that, then we'll deal with everything else."

The way he ends the statement makes me nervous. Nothing is ever free. I've learned that lesson and then some. Every deal, every choice, comes with consequences that ripple out in ways you can't imagine, affecting people you thought would be kept far away and safe. I know I didn't save myself on Wickery Bridge. Someone else did. Something happened to make them go away. But when I glance over, he stares resolutely back at me. I know that look, and it means I'm not getting anything else out of him. Not right now. And even though I know I should be ready to tackle the next crisis, all I want is to curl up in my bed with Damon and close my eyes and feel rescued for a little while longer.

No wonder everyone drinks all the time: It leads to earth-shattering revelations.

"Will you please stay with me?" I whisper. I doubt a human would've heard me. But I know Damon does. I know I don't deserve to ask him, but I have to. He has to know that nothing has changed, and everything has. It's exactly as it's always been and completely new, all at the same time.

I watch him struggle. He wants to. I know he does. But in the end, he swallows. And then again. And a third time. "You need to sleep," he repeats.

"Damon..."

"Stefan will come and stay with you," he interrupts. Stefan is the last person I want to see right now. "You should probably apologize for running him through with a bedframe." His tone is light again. Teasing. He's pushing me away. "Points for creativity, though, and totally deniable since you were all crazy and everything. Plus you broke Klaus' bed, which is just fun. I hope it was a priceless antique with a great deal of sentimental value."

"Damon," I say again, reaching for his hand, but he's getting up. He takes a final swallow before capping the bottle and setting it on my nightstand.

"Really. You should call Stefan. I've got... well..." he looks away, obviously trying to come up with a good lie and failing miserably. "I've got some things I need to do." He flashes from the room, my eyes tracking him only as a blur, leaving me once again alone.

I probably should take his advice. Maybe drink some more of Ric's bourbon and close my eyes. Instead of the bottle, though, I pick up my phone. I can't do anything until I take care of this because I am not cruel. To anyone. I am not Katherine.

He picks up on the first ring.

"Stefan, we need to talk. Can you meet me at the house?"


	6. Game Changing Switch

_A/N: Since we didn't have a new episode this week, I thought I'd experiment and try a completely drunk narrator, which I've never written before. This is Damon following the whirlwind of events from Isobel (1.21), Founder's Day (1.22), and The Return (2.1). Please let me know what you think. My heart-felt gratitude and respect, always, for CreepingMuse's generosity and talent and kindness and honesty._

* * *

**Game Changing Switch**

**"**Damon?" Stefan's voice sounds far away, like he's in the bottom of a well. Or maybe I'm the one who's sitting in a hole somewhere. Hard to say, but it doesn't really matter. He's quiet and gentle, and it's weird because just this morning we were posturing and threatening and fighting, and I helped Elena vervain and imprison him a couple days ago, and then I thought I'd kissed her, and he should still be pissed off. But he just sounds sad and worried. Figures. Stefan's not really happy unless he can feel guilty and sad and worried about something. He's fucked up like that.

Then again, who am I to judge because fuckedupness obviously runs in the family and, as it turns out, I'm not alone at the bottom of a well. Just alone on the floor, I think, although who the fuck knows why I'm sitting here. Last I checked, I was on the sofa. Much more comfortable than the floor. But is alone ever really comfortable, even with good lumbar support and luxurious upholstery? So really, what difference does it make? I could go and find a well and fall in it, and it really wouldn't matter. Maybe Lassie would save me, which would actually suck because dogs fucking stink.

"Damon? Open your eyes."

I force my eyes to focus and see Stefan, who's down on his haunches and not too close, like he's afraid to spook a wild animal. The squirrels have been talking, and there's open rebellion in the woods. However will he go on feeling superior if he's fighting a mutiny of forest creatures?

Oh. Wait. I get it: I'm the wild animal because I'm sitting on the floor in the corner, surrounded by empty bourbon bottles and shimmering broken glass, my hands covered in blood. I don't remember that happening. This isn't metaphorical blood either. Nope. This is the real kind, all wet and sticky and delicious. I find my tongue and lick it. Blaugh. It's mine. My own blood is not delicious. It tastes just like me, and even though I've been told otherwise by multitudes of faceless humans who maybe should start counting for something other than a meal and fuck, the people who matter don't think I'm a tasty treat at all.

"Damon? Can you hear me?"

Isobel said it to Elena, but we all heard. _He's in love with you. _She said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world. No one was surprised when she said those words. _He's in love with you._ But I'd not thought of it like that before. Sure, I crave her company and try to make her laugh and hate when I can't help but hear her and Stefan in his bed and it felt so fucking good to have her dancing in my arms, but it didn't occur to me that somewhere along the way I'd fallen in love with her. And Isobel just said it. That I love her. And after she said it, I realized it was true.

I love Elena.

The fucking simplicity of the words hung in the air as we all stood there, not moving or saying anything until it started to get awkward. I couldn't help but look at Stefan because this was just too fucking much because we already did this once before and look how well that's turned out. I tried to decide if Stefan was going to stake me right then and there, and maybe he should have at least tried because this cannot happen again because Katherine was bad enough, and for all the times I hate him I don't want to spend another century tormenting him and hurting him and following him around to clean up his mutilated bodies. But even with that worry front and center, I heard Elena's heart. The way it pounded in her chest, the way the blood rushed to her cheeks and colored her face, whether from embarrassment or something else, I have no fucking clue. But when Stefan held her to him, I think more to comfort himself than to comfort her, she didn't tear her gaze away from me. Her arms were around him, but she was looking at me. That fucking means something. I just don't know what.

Elena sees me. She's always seen me. And Elena is not Katherine. Nope. Not even a little bit. It's freaky as all fuck, actually, how two identical girls can be so incredibly different. Earlier, at the parade, with her curls and her little waist and that dress that kept everything hidden and mysterious and somehow so much more sexy than the clothes girls wear today, Jesus fucking Christ, she looked like Katherine. It's good I don't need to breathe because I couldn't when I saw her dressed like that. I was relieved when she took off the goddamn thing and showed up at the Grille in her Converse to scold. _Stefan's worried about our... friendship_. Even she didn't know the word to use right away.

Yes, Elena's my friend. Or she was my friend until a few hours ago. My only friend in this whole fucking world.

"Damon?" Stefan asks again, moving just a little bit closer. "Can you hear me?"

"Yes, I can hear you," I say. I meant to snap, but my tongue is too big for my mouth, and I have to swallow around it a couple of times. "Have you ever fucking heard of a deaf vampire?"

Heard of a deaf vampire. Oh, that's funny 'cause actually, no, deaf vampires can't hear a goddamn thing. I think I laugh, it might be a laugh, or maybe it's trying to be something else, but it's a sound that comes out all wrong, caught somewhere between my chest and my mouth, and it hurts my head, and when I make sure my head is still where it's supposed to be because there's a really good chance it's not attached anymore, my hands burn and now there's blood on my face and... I need to find my tongue... and... yep, still just my blood.

Fuck. I could use someone else's blood right about now.

The first time Katherine bit her wrist so I could drink from her, I gagged. Thicker and not as hot as the blood I saw and touched and had splattered on me in battle, it still reminded me too much of the war. I couldn't be weak or soft or human in front of her, so I forced myself to swallow even though I wanted to throw up, god please don't let me throw up Katherine's blood in her bed. She laughed and licked her own blood from my lips and whispered how we would be together forever.

Funny how short forever ended up being.

It's little things that gave Elena away, even in that dress and with those curls. Those wonderful curls. I remember burying my face in Katherine's, the smell of her saturated into my skin after she'd been sleeping curled against me all night. Even my pathetic human nose could smell her on me for the rest of the day, and I would sniff the backs of my hands, my wrists, to be reminded of her, lay in my bed in the dark when she wasn't there, her pillow over my face.

"What happened?" he asks.

I look up even though it makes my head hurt and make my eyes focus again. He points to the broken glass and my bloody hands and the smashed end-table and the books all over the floor.

"Katherine," I say.

I should've known she wasn't Elena on her porch. Except I didn't want to. And it'd been such a fucked up day. First the Isobel bombshell, and then Stefan doing his whole _History will not be repeating itself where Elena is concerned. Do you understand what I'm saying?_ Fucking asshole. And realizing that John fucking Gilbert is Elena's father, only not being able to do a goddamn thing about it except clue in Stefan, who's too fucking stupid to fucking add two plus two to equal nine months.

What are the fucking odds that two people as selfish as Isobel and John could mix their shit and create such perfection?

I should've killed John for being her father and giving her away but not really. For being such an asshole. I should've killed him but for real. I actually like to kill people, and no one likes John, not even John, so it'd be a win-win. But I don't need reasons to kill people. It's just what I do.

"Katherine was here? At the house?" Stefan asks. "Did she do this? Damon?"

If he says my name one more time I will somehow find my feet and get off this floor so I can fucking snap his fucking neck. Stop talking, Stefan. I need you to stop talking because I'm trying to black out. Can't you see I'm trying to drink myself into oblivion? Do you understand how fucking hard that is for a vampire to do? And you're fucking ruining it.

"Stop. Talking. Go. Away."

"I'll be right back," he says.

I couldn't help Anna. It's a shit day when the best you can say is at least she didn't have to burn to death. Terrible fucking way to die. She deserved better than that. She just loved her mom. I get that. Wanting someone. Missing someone for so long that it's all you know how to do. Not being complete without her and just wanting her back no matter what it takes or what it costs or who has to get hurt or die to make it happen. Nothing else matters because you're trying to find the rest of yourself.

Yeah. I understand Anna. Only I couldn't do a goddamn thing but watch as John Gilbert staked her. All that was left was to tell Jeremy so someone could mourn her. And maybe forgive me.

Me, Damon Salvatore, reduced to wanting a fucking kid with ridiculous hair to forgive me for something that wasn't my goddamn fault. I'm as bad as St. Stefan of the Fucking Squirrels. So I apologized for Vicki even though I'm not sorry about Vicki at all, but I wanted to tell him that I was sorry, and it was the only thing I could think of that maybe he could understand. I'm not very good at apologies because I apologize even less often than I thank, but I stood there in that kid's room and just fucking wanted him to know that he didn't have to be so pissed off and sad. I wanted to remind him that he wasn't alone.

What a fucking idiot I was to think I had something to offer him that maybe would've helped, that maybe he would've wanted. And what a brave kid. Jeremy fucking Gilbert. When I gave him the easy way out, he didn't take it. Not like me. I flipped my switch and didn't look back for decades. _Life sucks either way, Jeremy, but at least if you're a vampire, you don't have to feel bad about it if you don't want to. _Only I didn't tell him that without pain there's no joy either. Just emptiness. Nothing. Oblivion. Which is great for a while. Until it's not anymore.

"Damon?" Stefan slowly steps back into view. He's speaking to me like I'm fucking nuts. Or a child. Or both. Maybe he's afraid I'm about to snap and go on my own Ripper binge. Wouldn't that be ironic? But he sweeps away the glass, the sound of it crunching and tinkling too loudly in the quiet room, and he's on his knees next to me. The warm, wet cloth feels so good on my face that I think I moan just a little bit.

"I'm just going to pull out the pieces," he says as he examines my hand, carefully removing shards of bourbon bottles and crystal glasses so the wounds can heal.

What is fucking wrong with me? I wanted to help. I wanted to make Jeremy feel better and hug Liz because she was crying and save Caroline even though I can't stand that girl, even when she used to be compelled to be my sex toy, because I know Elena loves her and that's reason enough for me.

Look at me: so fucking helpful. I've become a goddamn hero, only no one wants my rescuing.

Fuck me.

No one wants to rescue me either. Not really. I only got saved because Elena loves Stefan, and Stefan loves me. I should've burned in that fire like Anna, only the slow, horrible way, and no one would've been sad except for Stefan. And I think maybe Elena would've been sad too, if I died. Before tonight. She wouldn't be sad now, but she would've been if I'd died last night.

I should've known it wasn't Elena on the porch. Except Katherine didn't kiss me like Katherine. Katherine doesn't hesitate. Katherine kissed like Katherine tonight, in the parlor, only I've never kissed Katherine as a vampire. It was everything I'd hoped it would be when I begged her to change me, so I wouldn't be weak, so she wouldn't have to be so careful with me. I used to want more from Katherine, always more, and she would laugh and pin me to the bed and bite me and leave bruises on my arms and I wouldn't be able to move my legs because her thighs were so strong as she straddled me.

She showed me one time, on a slave, how easy it was for her to crush a human hand, snap a human wrist, crack a human rib. She had to be careful so she didn't hurt me.

She used to bite her tongue and kiss me with her blood trickling into my mouth. Why couldn't she have done that tonight, when I could've fucking enjoyed it?

_Come on: kiss me or kill me. Which will it be, Damon? We both know you're only capable of one._

I wasn't going to kiss her. Not ever again. Not after that soft, curious kiss on the porch that was so much like how I imagined Elena would kiss me that I dared to fucking hope that once, just fucking once, I was good enough for the girl to love me back. That I was a man worth loving. Worth saving. Not because of my saintly brother but just for me. I thought I was enough on my own. Only no. As it turns out, I'm not. Those fucking thirty minutes between the porch and arriving at the hospital were the best thirty minutes of the past 145 years, and Katherine fucking knew they would be, and that bitch did it on purpose because she's fucking cruel.

And I was going to kill her. For daring me to hope. For threatening Elena. For not killing John Gilbert when she had the chance. For making Stefan bleed at that miserable goddamn whatever the hell that pre-funeral thing was at Carol Lockwood's. What is it with this fucking town and social functions? Someone always ends up dead. Why do people keep showing up to the fucking things?

I was going to kill Katherine tonight because for all the women and men I've kissed, thousands upon thousands of mind-blowing, knee-buckling, breath-taking kisses, the only two people on this planet I've ever wanted to kiss because I love them don't love me back. I can't be a lover, so I'll be a killer instead. Just like when I was alive and all I was good for was killing soldiers in a war I didn't give a shit about. Fine and fucking dandy. I was going to kill her.

Only I couldn't kill Katherine. I kissed her, just like she knew I would. And I was ready to forgive her. I wasn't just saying that so I could fuck her like I always wanted to, without either of us being fragile. I'm fucking pathetic enough that I would've walked away from 145 years of missing her, from the fact that she fucking abandoned us in the road when we fucking died for her. Our own father shot us because of her, and she just walked away.

We could've started over. Only she loves Stefan. Always Stefan. And I'm pathetic, but not pathetic enough to be content acting only as her fucking dildo, which is why I had to ask even though I already knew what her answer would be. I had to hear her fucking say it.

"She came back for you," I tell Stefan when he's finished with my other hand. It does feel better, without the glass pieces, the skin knitting itself back together.

"Damon," he starts, gently wiping one last time with the cloth now that the bleeding has stopped.

"She doesn't want me," I say. "She never wanted me."

And now Elena hates me. I made sure of that. _You want to turn off the pain? It's the easiest thing in the world. The part of you that cares just goes away. All you have to do is flip the switch and snap. _

I love snapping necks almost as much as I love kissing. The initial resistance. The satisfying crack when the bones give. The way the body immediately slumps into dead weight. Elena doesn't want my kisses or my love, but I can't kill her anymore than I can kill Katherine, so I had to kill someone. It's all I'm good for.

_I love Stefan. It's always going to be Stefan. _

Fuck it all to fucking hell. Always fucking Stefan. The same fucking words coming out of identical mouths, and it happened so fast, and I just couldn't stand the way she looked at me with such fucking pity. I may have craved gratitude and forgiveness. I may have wanted her to admit that she feels something for me, that I didn't just fucking make it up, but I sure as fuck don't need anyone's pity, especially not hers. Oh, she _cares_.

I don't want to be Elena's friend. I don't want her to _care_. If she can't love me, the next best thing is for her to hate me. I'm a killer. A vicious, evil killer who doesn't give a shit that she only cares and doesn't love me, and now I've made sure she never will.

It's so easy. Snap.

"Damon," Stefan says. "Katherine doesn't want either of us. She left us both. She's not back for me, and we both know it. Don't let her do this to you. You're better than this."

"That's what she said," I say. I can't even say her name, but Stefan knows who I mean. "But I'm not. And now she hates me."

"She doesn't hate you."

"You don't know what I did."

"Yes I do." I make myself look at him, and he's suddenly way too close, his eyes the color of a stormy sea. They're sad but thank fucking Christ they're not pitying. I can't handle his pity either. "John Gilbert gave Jeremy his ring."

I blink a few times and try to move my tongue out of the way so I can swallow. What the fuck does that mean?

"Jeremy came back," Stefan says, like he can read my mind. Or maybe I said it out loud. I don't fucking know. "He didn't stay dead."

Oh.

I try to make my face look like of course I knew that. Of course I wouldn't have killed Jeremy if I didn't know he'd come back. Of course John Gilbert gave away his immortality ring after pissing off a bunch of vampires. Of course I haven't been trying my damnedest to drink myself into oblivion because Elena will hate me forever for killing her little brother who's not even her brother but her cousin, and now that I think about it, that's really very fucked up.

Like all the other people I've killed lately, John Gilbert and Ric, Jeremy's death didn't take. Killing's all I'm good for, and at the moment, I'm not even very good at it.

"She's mad," he quietly admits. He hands me a glass of blood and looks away while I drink it.

It must be hard for him to be so close, to smell it, to want something so desperately, every molecule in his body screaming for something he won't give in and allow himself to taste.

Yeah. I get that too.

"But she doesn't hate you. She..." Stefan is quiet for so long that I think maybe I finally blacked out, only I'm still not that lucky. "You're about to drop that," he says, plucking the now-empty glass from my hand. "Come on. I'll help you upstairs. You have a couple hours to sleep before your meeting with Carol Lockwood."

"I'm not meeting Carol Lockwood," I say as he helps me to my feet and wraps his arm around me to steer me towards the stairs. I try to make my legs move correctly, but he's doing most of the work for me.

"Yes you are. And I'm going to school. It's going to be just another day."

Sure. No big deal. Nothing new around here. Same ol' Mystic Fucking Falls.

"For what it's worth," he finally says when we're in my room. He pushes me onto the bed and takes off my boots. "I think she loves you too, in her own way. Jeremy didn't stay dead, and we all know you didn't mean it."

I don't have to tell him that at the time, in that split second, when I wrapped my hands around Jeremy's neck, I did mean it. The crack of Jeremy's spine was the only thing that felt good, that made sense. It was deliciously easy. Stefan knows I meant it, no matter how sorry I am now, because for all our fights and threats, Stefan and I understand each other.

"She'll forgive you," he says.

"She doesn't love me," I say, closing my eyes. That thing I thought before, about lonely always being uncomfortable no matter the thread count? I was as fucking wrong about that as everything else. I love my bed almost as much as I love my shower. "She loves you. She can't love just one of us. But she only loves me because she loves you, and you love me."

It's a long time before he whispers, "Yeah. I do."


	7. Then, Now, Nirvana

_A/N: So, gentle readers... That was fun, eh? CreepingMuse talked me down from the ledge, where I was screaming and threatening all sorts of things I didn't mean and throwing a tantrum of epic proportions. She did all that AND beta-ed, so... um... yeah. Totally fan-fucking-tastic individual. But even assuming this sire-bond thing goes down, which I'm not convinced actually will, that doesn't change the moment at the end of "My Brother's Keeper." So here's my take on it. Please note the absence of day-drinking. I see Damon drinking his morning coffee (with more bourbon than coffee) as a kind of public service, but he won't want that today. As always, I would love to know what you think, and if you feel like some holiday fun, I have a new story that's set in my AU, 12 Days of Christmas._

* * *

**Then, Now, Nirvana**

Have you ever wanted something for so long, for so fucking long, that you've given up hope it can ever happen? You hold it close, safe, next to your heart, and you try not to think about it because thinking about how much you want it only makes it hurt more. And when you are fucking weak, when you crack and indulge and imagine what it would feel like to have it, the wanting is so desperate it threatens to consume you with desire. You're the worse for that glimpse of what you can't ever have because you have to go on without it, that missing piece you need to be complete.

Have you ever needed something so fucking much?

When she showed up at the house last night, her little bag over her shoulder and a grim determination not to cry on her face, Stefan invited her to pick a room. Fucking Stefan the drama queen, walking out like that, leaving nothing but guilt and grief in his wake.

I never considered she'd pick my room out of the house full of empty bedrooms. Her bag is still in the front hall, but she is here, with me, in my room. In my bed.

Last night actually happened. I didn't dream it. I didn't make it up.

No. This is real. I want to pinch myself, but I'm afraid I'll wake her if I move. I don't even want to open my eyes, so I bite my tongue instead. Fuck. My blood. Yep. This is for sure, verified real.

Elena loves me.

She chose me.

We made love last night. Again and again and into the morning.

The last time I made love, actually used every part of my body to show a woman I loved her with every ounce of my being, I was a human. A strong, battled-hardened human, but human all the same. Limitations in terms of stamina and physicality.

Not anymore.

I never thought this would happen. When she held my hand in her room, that gave me hope. I dared to dream that maybe, one day, many many years from now. I hoped for maybe.

You couldn't pay me to move a single muscle right now. I am so here. Right here. Now. With her.

I get why Stefan left. I've not slept here many nights because even with our rooms as far away from each other as possible, there's no way we can't hear what's going on anywhere in the house. Despite his assertions that this is my best day ever, I didn't plan on it ending this way. I spent most of the day worried about Stefan. We only just got him back. He is a man teetering on the edge, and I don't want him to fall over. Not ever again. I hope I never have to see another ripped apart body or the look of horror and shame on Stefan's face when he comes to and realizes what he's done. And I know Elena is a big reason he's been able to pull himself together so quickly this time. Because he loves her so fucking much.

Yes, I love her too. But I love my brother. It kills me to know that for one of us to have who we want, the other one of us is left behind. No matter how this story unfolds, someone ends up hurt, and because we all love each other, all three of us, that means we all end up hurt. It's fucked all to hell. You think that's my idea of a good time?

I was happy just with the dance. With her saying she wanted to dance with me. She wanted to dance with_ me_. God, I'm so pathetic that that's enough. She didn't promise always and forever. Just today, now, this moment. And that's enough to make me the happiest man on the planet. To offer her my hand, knowing it's the hand she wants. She didn't dance with me because Stefan wouldn't, or because he was eating someone else, or for any reason other than she wanted to. She wanted to dance with me. That's all I need: to know I'm the one she wants.

Fucking Christ, I'm pathetic.

I was okay with just dancing. With waiting. I've waited 145 years. What's a few more days? Months, even? Hell, I could wait decades. I've been waiting for the past year and a half while she's been with Stefan, and it's gone by in the blink of an eye. Time. We're vampires. We have all the time we could ever possibly need or want and then some. I was more than willing to be patient while she figures out this new version of who she is. To take it slow until she's sure of who and what she wants.

But I kissed her first. I did. That was me. I admit the kiss. Her, in my arms, with the warmth of the fire and that sweet smile on her lips, like we were sharing a secret. I had to have a taste of that perfect moment. Just a little taste. I wasn't going to let it go too far. I wasn't going to push her. Just a kiss, with us sober and not dying and not under Stefan's orders to figure out what she wants. Just one kiss that's fucking real. That's all I wanted.

I tasted the bourbon on her lips, but I could taste her too. Not her blood, just the unique taste of Elena. Everything about her that I love distilled into a scent and a taste that's just _her._

She's different now that she's a vampire, but she's still Elena. I didn't tell her she's never looked more alive just to make her feel good. I mean it. She's ferocious and glorious and perfect. Absolutely fucking perfect. Her kisses even taste perfect. Stefan and Caroline are fucking nuts to see her as someone who needs to be fixed. Elena is most definitely not broken. They're deaf and dumb and blind, and yes I love my brother, but fuck them both for making her feel like she has anything to be sorry for or ashamed of.

But I was going to stop there. Just one kiss. Only then she kissed me back. She wrapped herself around me like she was trying to crawl inside my skin, like she could never be close enough. Her tongue filled my mouth with wet deliciousness, her fingers were in my hair, and she refused the chaste kiss I offered. She wanted more. She needed more.

Elena needed me.

I am not my brother. I am not a fucking hero, and I am not a saint, and I don't even pretend to be. When push comes to fucking shove, I am an animal. A man. And Elena is _the_ woman. The woman I love, the woman I would happily give everything for. She wants me. She chose me. And when she threw me against the wall, tossing aside the table and lamp and ripping off my shirt, I sure as shit wasn't going to turn her away.

Part of me worries that this, like everything else where Elena is concerned, is going to hurt me a whole lot more than it hurts her. Loving Elena has always been so fucking hard because she loves everyone the same, and I want her to love me differently. I don't want to share her. Share her love. I want, have always wanted, all of her all to myself, even as I understand that the beauty of Elena is that she loves everyone so fucking much. God, the girl loves. But loving Elena has hurt more than anything else in my life, and I've done some seriously painful shit.

I worry that she'll change her mind, like she always does. That she'll come back to me from time to time, but she doesn't want me, not like she wants Stefan. She doesn't want me for always. I worry that when she opens her eyes, I'll see regret there. I'll see disgust, at me or herself or both. If she rejects me now, like she always has...

But I'm a fucking optimist.

As much as I worry about Stefan, as much as I worry about Elena, I couldn't play it safe last night. Not when we were alone in the house, and she pressed against my bare chest and kissed me like she was making love to my mouth. I was going to love her. Worship her. Show her all the ways she's brought back the man I was, the man I thought died long before I met Katherine. Before my father killed me. She awakened the man I thought I'd lost forever. She found him. Found me.

Elena.

It was so hard, but I kept giving her space. It was torture, keeping my hands off of her, putting them up, away from her in case she changed her mind. I'm so much stronger than she is, even now that she's a vampire, and I didn't want her to feel forced or hurried or pushed. I wanted her to choose, to walk away if that's what she wanted.

"Touch me," she whispered. "Damon, God, I need you to touch me. Please."

So I flipped her against the wall, lifted her leg up to my hip, her little dress leaving long, bare stretches of smooth thigh for my fingers to touch.

"Yes. God... I... yes. Oh God. Damon. Yes. Like that... Do that..."

She was frantic, pleading as she unbuttoned my pants right there in the parlor, like I would fuck her against the wall like I've done so many times with so many other people. Not Elena. Not the first time. Not like that. Not half-clothed and against the wall, not even when she begged.

"Please, Damon. Please. Do it. Please. I need you. Inside me. God. Please. Now."

We kissed and touched our way across the room, shedding clothes as we went. I'd forgotten how good it is to kiss someone like that, to kiss someone I love. I poured everything I ever wanted to say to her, all the feelings I don't have words for, all the love and fear and gratitude and love and love and love, into those kisses. I kissed her like I've never kissed anyone.

Fingers and tongues exploring and caressing and probing and panting breaths and racing blood and hearts that wanted desperately to beat even though they don't anymore.

We stalled at the door to my bedroom, Elena straining against me, once more trying to take off my pants while we stood against a wall.

"Damon. Oh God. Damon."

Somewhere along the way, she lost control and vamped out, and our kisses became blood-flavored, which made me vamp out. Her exquisite taste mingled with mine on my tongue, my lips tingling as she nicked and bit and sucked and licked my mouth.

It was so fucking good it couldn't last. Not like that. And it didn't. Not the first time. I'd barely gotten our clothes off, torn her dress and my pants and lowered her to my bed when she reached up, grasped me in her hand, rubbing the tip, spreading the wetness that bubbled out of me, before positioning me right where she wanted.

"Please," she begged.

And I wanted, more than anything, to please her.

We both came almost immediately. She sucked my tongue into her mouth, her hands in my hair, her thighs gripping my hips, the wet heat of her pulling at me, vibrating and moaning as she came, making me come too.

I cried out. Crushed her to me because I never want to let her go. She buried her face in my neck, me still inside her, and bit hard, sucking at the wound at my neck. It was as if she'd pried apart my sternum, reached into my chest with her bare hand, and forced my heart to beat again.

It was perfect fucking agony wrapped up in exquisite ecstasy, and that was just the first time.

Then there was my tongue tracing every delicate line of her, swirling and licking and tasting every single inch, devouring every one of her most secret places. She pushed me to the bed to do the same. We made each other moan and cry out and scream and whimper and growl and purr and beg and make sounds I don't even have names for.

I've been around for so fucking long that I thought I'd experienced everything that could possibly be done. But I'd never had Elena, her arms wrapped around me, her hungry, curious kisses that were surprisingly tender for their intensity. It's cheesy as all fuck, but she wiped out everyone and everything that came before, leaving only her, the feel of her lips and her fingers and her skin and her hair, the taste of her blood and her wet heat and her tongue and the droplets of sweat I licked from her skin.

It was better than my wildest dream come true.

Only this time, it's not a dream. It's not wishful thinking. I haven't opened my eyes yet, but I can smell her all over me, all over my sheets and pillows. Her body is curled around me. Even in her sleep she couldn't get close enough. Her long hair is tickling my chest, her breath moist against my skin, and she has one leg entwined with mine, her arm thrown across me, her fingers resting against my cheek.

This is the dream, but it's actually true.

It's happening.

It happened.

I feel like the kid on Christmas morning, who wakes up to a freshly fallen blanket of snow, who finds what his heart most desires just laying there, waiting for him. I get it now, why people watch those stupid fucking movies and cry, year after year, even though they know the guy's going to get his family back and the angel will earn his fucking wings. They do it for a glimpse of this feeling, of this moment. Of daring to hope that you can, in fact, have what you want, what you need, what your heart most desires.

Elena loves me.

I can't stand it any longer, and I open my eyes. The sun is shining through the windows, and her hair has exploded into a riot of colors. All together, it usually just looks straight and brown, but here, in my bed, with the sun hitting it just right, I can see all the other colors hiding in there. Like Elena herself, the most beautiful parts of her hair aren't obvious as first glance, but there's red and gold and a color I don't have a word for. Does everyone see the complexity? The strength and the goodness and the beauty that disguises itself as just another girl who happens to look exactly like the most selfish bitch who ever walked the planet?

God.

Elena loves me.

Elena chose me.

If this is a dream, I don't ever want to wake up.


	8. Right By You

_A/N: My beta-extraordinaire, CreepingMuse, did another fantabulous job. She is endlessly entertaining and generous and funny and wicked smart, and you should all send her presents... I realize that I may be wandering into uncharted waters here, since I don't know where the show intends to go with all this sire-business. I do plan on staying in-canon for this project, though, and if I need to back-pedal next week, depending on where the writers take us... well... I'll cross that bridge if I come to it. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy what I think happened after the screen faded to black at the end of "We'll Always Have Bourbon Street."_

* * *

**Right By You**

"I have to do the right thing by you."

There are tears in her eyes, but thank fuck she isn't all-out crying. She steps closer to me, that determined look on her face that scares the shit out of me because I know it all too well, and it doesn't mean anything good. It means she's about to be ultimately reckless and piss me off.

Except she takes my hand in hers and puts it over her heart.

I remember when I did that to her, what feels like lifetimes ago, in Ric's loft. She was sweating and breathing hard. Her blood was pumping and she smelled deliciously of adrenaline and fear. She was working to the brink of exhaustion so she could fight back, and I put her hand over my heart and showed her how to stake a vampire. Not there, not through the sternum with her human girl arms. I showed her how to sneak up from behind, how to stake in the back. She was pressed tightly against my chest, my fingers lingering on her moist skin.

That morning in Ric's loft, I promised to do whatever it took to keep her safe. The unspoken vow that I would stake my own brother for her, if that's what needed to be done. I promised to not be selfish, to only think about her.

Always her.

"Does this feel wrong?" she whispers.

My hand over her heart feels like coming home.

God, good Christ, and the saints in heaven, I love this girl. I love her. All of her. Every last hair on her infuriating head. But I don't want her like this.

Not like this.

I have to do this. I have to let her go.

She caresses my face with her other hand, her touch light and reverent and the exact opposite of the touches in my bed yesterday morning when her nails drew blood on my back that she licked clean before skipping off to school with swollen lips and messy hair. She touches me like I'm the most precious thing in the world. Like I'm special. Like she loves me.

"Does this feel wrong?"

I close my eyes and allow myself this moment, this one selfish moment, to feel her, only her, her perfect skin on mine, touching me not to fuck me or hurt me or take something from me. She's not using me or playing games. She wants to touch me. Because she thinks she loves me.

I have to swallow back tears because I am a pathetic fucking fool, but I cannot, will not, break down now. Not in front of her. I can't make this worse. Is this my penance? Is this the price I have to pay for all the lives I've taken, for all the things I've done that I'm not sorry for?

"It doesn't," I finally whisper. "God, Elena, nothing has ever felt so right in all my years on this earth. And that's why..."

Her lips on mine effectively cut off the rest of my words, and I open my eyes because I can't miss a single second of kisses that aren't meant for me, of Elena's love that I desperately need to be but isn't real. I am not a saint, and I am not a hero. I am a selfish fuck who will cherish the memory of these stolen touches for the rest of my life.

They aren't the frantic kisses in front of the fire that led us to my bed. She kisses me gently. Tenderly. She kisses me like we have all the time in the world. She kisses as if the act itself is holy.

"Elena, stop," I say. I rest my forehead against hers for just a second before I force myself to step away from her. "Stop. Listen to me."

"No, you listen," she says, anger flashing through her eyes, turning them red for just a second before they return to their unreadable brown. Good Christ, but she's beautiful when she's angry.

"I'm sick of everyone deciding what's best for me. You, Stefan, Caroline. Meredith injecting me with blood without telling anyone. Everyone tells me what to do and what I need and how I should act and what I should feel and who I should feel it for. Why don't I get a say in my own life?"

She stares at me, as if she is looking into my heart, into my very soul. She's always done that. Flayed me alive with just a look. I can't hurt her. I can't make her unhappy. I can't bear to disappoint her. But I need to do this. I need to be the man she believes I am because I love her so fucking much.

"Because your say isn't really yours," I gently say.

"This is me, Damon. Me. For better or for worse, this is me." She steps back and wipes a tear from her eye with her fingers, the gesture more angry than anything.

"Please don't cry," I say, flinching when I realize they're the same words I said to Charlotte this morning. Only Elena doesn't magically stop crying like Charlotte did. She cries harder, actually, more tears escaping and running down her cheeks even though she doesn't make a sound. She wipes at them with her fists, like I imagine she did alone, at night, after she lost her parents.

Christ, it's so easy to forget that she's just a girl.

"I'm not crying," she insists, sounding every bit the petulant teenager. "Stupid vampire emotions."

"Yeah," I agree, remembering how incredible it was when I first flipped my switch and made it all stop. Just fucking stop. Oblivion. Not feeling like I was going to burst out of my own skin. "Takes some getting used to. They're a bit..."

"So help me," she snaps. "If you tell me my emotions are 'heightened,' I will find something wooden and stab you."

Okay. Actually, I deserve that. More than that. I'll let her stab me, if it'll make her feel better. Small price to pay, really.

She wipes her face dry with her sleeve and looks at me, that scary determined look that means she's about to say something insufferably and infuriatingly stupid because that's what Elena does best.

"I'm not some obsessed or lovesick girl," she says.

Oh Charlotte. Poor Charlotte counting all those fucking bricks for seventy years. Seventy fucking years counting bricks because I told her to. I fucking told her to count bricks because I am a selfish fuck and didn't know if I could believe the witch, and I needed her to leave me alone so I could be with my brother, the only person in the world besides Katherine who I actually loved at that point in time. Only I didn't go with Stefan, and Charlotte stayed there, right there. Waiting for me. Counting fucking bricks.

Fucking Christ.

I can't have that kind of power over Elena. I can't turn her into a fucking lunatic.

I can't ruin her.

"I'm not the sad little girl who fell madly and blindly in love with Stefan," Elena says. "I wasn't that girl before I died. Not for a long time before I died. And this girl, the girl I am now, the extreme version of the girl who died, loves you. Loves all of you. This sire-thing only proves that I loved you when I was alive. I fell in love with you even though I didn't want to, but I fell in love with you knowing exactly who you are and what you're capable of, the good and the bad. This is real."

Those are the words I've been waiting for her to say since I met her, but I can't believe them. Not when they're not real.

She doesn't love me.

"You love Stefan," I quietly insist.

"Yes, I love Stefan."

See? Right there. She's agreeing with me. Fuck.

"Part of me will always love Stefan," she says. "But so what? You love him too. You aren't mutually exclusive, you know. In fact, I don't know that it's even possible to love one of you without loving the other."

"Tell that to Caroline..."

"Shut up!" she interrupts.

My mouth snaps closed. Yes ma'am.

"I was afraid." She swallows and wipes more angry tears. "I was afraid that night. I was a terrified girl, and a coward, and I thought we were all going to die so it didn't matter anyway."

"That was less than two weeks ago," I quietly point out.

"It was lifetimes ago, dammit."

Shit. Now she's cursing. She even sounds more like me.

Fuck.

"Why can't you hear what I'm saying?" she asks. "Why do you insist on being unworthy? You make me so mad!"

She stomps to the bar and pours two brimming glasses of bourbon. She has to take a sip out of each one so she doesn't spill as she brings them back to me. I have no idea why we're awkwardly standing here instead of sitting down, at least being more physically comfortable while we tear out each other's metaphorical hearts. But she seems to want to stand, so we'll stand.

She swallows half her glass in one gulp. She smiles through a shudder. "Still getting used to bourbon, but it's growing on me."

"What if that's just me too?" I whisper. What if whiskey is like the blood? Fuck, she nearly died because I told her she could only drink from the vein. She almost died, and it was all my fault. God, all these little things, countless little fucking things that might not be what she wants.

"What if you really hate it but you're drinking it because of me?"

"Name me one vampire who doesn't drink," she says. "Better yet, name me one person who actually liked their first drinks, who didn't do it just to get drunk."

I remember the first time my father invited me into his study after dinner. I was thirteen, all awkward legs and cracking voice, and he poured a splash of whiskey into my glass before filling it the rest of the way with water. We sat in the chairs by the fire, and he lectured me about the ugly necessity of slavery and how the damned Yankees were hypocrites because they were profiting as much as we were.

I wouldn't let myself gag or make faces or flinch even though it burned and tasted awful because I wanted him to see that I was a man. But I hated every last drop. I couldn't wait until he dismissed me so I could head down to the kitchen for my usual cup of warmed milk with honey. Mary, who ran the kitchen, sprinkled dried lavender into it, and I cuddled into her side by the banked kitchen fire while she stroked my hair. She was the only person who ever did that after my mother died, who touched me with soft and loving hands, and nothing had ever tasted so good as that milk.

"Loving Stefan is easy," Elena finally says. "Easier than loving you because you make it hard on purpose. And when I was human, when I was that girl who wanted to die like she was supposed to a year and half ago with her parents, that meant something."

"It doesn't now?"

"Not really," she says, shrugging.

Fuck. What if that's me too? Yes, okay, maybe she had feelings for me before she turned, but that doesn't mean a goddamn thing if my blood is overriding her good sense now.

"I'm still learning," Elena says. "I'm going to make mistakes. But they're my mistakes. Mine. And you're the one who told me that I was lying to myself, to you, to Stefan, when I wouldn't admit there was something between us. You said that over a year ago. And Caroline lectured me all summer about my feelings for you. She compared you to both fungus and cancer."

I smile. "Well, I can think of worse things."

"Than growing on me like festering fungus?"

I can perfectly imagine Caroline describing me that way. In her defense, I gave her plenty of reasons to not like me, and it is a fan-fucking-tastic use of alliteration.

"I haven't done everything you've said since I turned," she says.

"Yes you have, Elena," I quietly say, wishing like hell it wasn't true.

"No, Damon. I haven't. I'm arguing with you right now, aren't I?"

I reluctantly nod. Does this count? Can I count this? Fuck, now I have to second-guess everything that comes out of her mouth, every single thing she says or does.

"What about that girl you first picked out on campus? The blond one? And you were so annoyed when I wouldn't drink from her because I saw the picture of her little sister?"

"Elena," I say.

"And Connor," she interrupts. "You told me to kill Connor."

"You did kill Connor."

She rolls her eyes. "Yes, but not at first. I tried to let him go, except then he staked me so I had to kill him. And then!" She's getting louder and more animated as other examples occur to her. "When I was hallucinating on the bridge, you told me to not kill myself, and I was going to anyway. It was Jeremy breaking the Hunter's Curse that stopped me, not you. And April's red dress? I liked the red dress. I thought it looked really great on her, but Caroline was in one of her moods, and I learned long ago, when she's like that, unless it's a matter of life or death, it's easier to just go along with her."

"Yes, but Elena," I say again.

"And last night," she interrupts again. "After Caroline dropped the S-bomb, I went and turned myself over to twelve angry hybrids so they could torture me and maybe kill me to piss off Klaus."

She smiles triumphantly, but I know I'm staring like an idiot. I have to remind myself not to squeeze too hard and shatter my glass.

"You did what?" I quietly ask.

"See, I knew that walking into a fight with hybrids is the very opposite of what you would want me to do, but I did it anyway."

"Elena, you did what?"

Twelve hybrids... That should mean something... What should that mean... I need to concentrate because, as usual, everything is going to shit because this is Mystic Fucking Falls, and our plans always go shit and spectacularly fail, and all I can think about is the fact that I need to step away from her, goddammit. It's for her own good, even if it's killing me, and she's making what's already too fucking hard completely impossible.

Fuck.

"I suggested they torture me," Elena nonchalantly adds before taking a demure sip of her drink.

"Elena..." I say, and I know there's an edge to my voice that shouldn't be there but goddamn this infuriating girl. What can you do about a girl with a fucking death wish?

"We had to because they had Caroline," she says, as if it's the most obvious thing in the world. "Tyler had to prove he's the alpha of the hybrid pack." She shakes her head. "It's some weird wolf-thing I don't completely understand. Wolves just may be even weirder than vampires, which is really saying something."

"I should fucking kill him for putting you in danger," I snap.

"Exactly," she says, smiling defiantly.

Why is she smiling? This is so fucking wrong. This situation is the opposite of smiles. We are so fucking far from tiptoeing through tulips and rainbows and fluffy puppies right now. She doesn't really love me, and she nearly got herself killed last night while I was in New Orleans with Stefan who, despite knowing me longer than anyone, doesn't know a goddamn thing about me. And the two of us brother-bonded over some miserable fucking memories and living, counting proof that I'm a miserable, selfish fuck.

"See, Damon? You're mad at me even though it's already done and everything worked out just fine. I knew you'd be mad, and I knew I was sired to you, and I did it anyway. I can make my own choices."

"Stupid fucking choices," I mutter.

"I love you, Damon," she repeats, ignoring my words that I know she heard. "I love you. And yes, I want to make you happy, but I know you want to make me happy too. You aren't the same man who first came to Mystic Falls. Isn't that what people who love each other do? Change? Grow? The lines get sort-of blurry where one person stops and the other starts? You tell the same jokes and finish each other's sentences and order what you know the other person likes at restaurants because he's going to end up eating half of it anyway? You do things you wouldn't ordinarily do because you want to make the other person happy? And it's sort-of selfish because when you make the person you love happy, you're making yourself happy too?"

"Elena, please," I whisper. She's describing everything I want, everything I've always fucking wanted, and I can't have it. Not now. Not ever. Not with her because this isn't real.

This is not real.

It can't ever be real, and there is nothing for me to do but walk away.

Fuck.

We both swallow the rest of our drinks, and Elena hands me her empty glass. Without prompting, I refill them both, only not nearly as full as before. Elena drunk is the last thing either of us needs right now. I hand her the fresh drink, and she raises an eyebrow at the modest couple of inches in the glass.

"My dad watched so many romantic comedies for my mom, and he hated those movies," Elena continues. "He watched them, and he paid attention so he could talk to her about them afterward. She knew he hated them, but those were the movies she always picked out anyway."

"I need for it to be real, Elena. You deserve real love."

"It is real!" She shakes her head and swallows all her bourbon at once, shuddering slightly. "We don't know anything about this sire-bond. You loved Katherine when her blood turned you. Why aren't you sired to her? Why isn't Stefan? Was Lexi's boyfriend sired to her? Why is it rare? Why else would a vampire turn someone unless they loved them?"

"I don't know," I spit out. "We don't know anything. We never fucking know anything until it's too fucking late to do a goddamn thing about it."

"Damon," she soothes, but I step further away from her.

"All I know is that I can't do this. Not with you, Elena. We are not experimenting with your free will, and the witch in New Orleans told me I had to walk away."

"You trust some random witch? You'll believe her when trusting witches has worked out so well for us in the past?" She rolls her eyes and snorts derisively.

"Elena, I just don't want you to feel..." My voice trails off. "I can't make you..."

Charlotte, counting fucking bricks for seventy years. Christ. I am so fucked up for making her do that. Why did I tell her to count bricks? Why didn't I tell her to find someone else to love? It would've been better to have told her to walk into the sunrise. I don't know how to live my own fucking life. I've spent too much of it goddamn miserable and alone, and now I'm responsible for Elena's life?

Fuck.

"So instead of figuring out what this means together, you've decided, completely on your own, without asking me what I think, that the best course of action is for you to run away?"

When she says it like that, I sound exactly like the selfish fuck I'm trying really hard not to be.

"Stefan agrees that it's the only way," I say.

"We both love Stefan," Elena gently says. "But let's go ahead and assume that he, like Caroline, has his own motivations when the topic of our... well... our us-ness... is concerned."

Us-ness. Our us-ness.

I have no idea what that fucking means, but I love that she called it our us-ness.

Ours.

She's making an absurd amount of sense. Either that or she's saying exactly what she thinks I need to hear. Maybe she's subconsciously agreeing with me when she doesn't actually agree with me at all.

Maybe us-ness is the last thing she wants from me, only she doesn't know it.

Fuck.

"I ran away from you once because I was afraid to figure out what I felt and what that meant," Elena says. "And I'm not going to let you make that same mistake. Not now. Not until we have all the information we need to make an informed, reasonable decision. Which we will make together."

"Elena, that sounds really good, but what if you can't do that? What if you can't make an informed decision ever again?"

"I trust you," she says.

"I don't," I whisper.

I can't do this.

I have to do this.

I have to walk away. Now. I need to get away from her.

I need to move to Australia.

"I trust you, Damon," she repeats. She takes a deep breath. "Okay. How about this: Look me in the eye and tell me that you want me to do what I want to do."

I raise my eyebrows. "Do you think that will work?"

"I think it's worth a try. If the whole sire-thing means I want to make you happy, and if me doing what I want makes you happy..." Her voices trails off. "I don't know. Magic doesn't make any sense. But it's better than you just walking away. Try it. Give it everything you've got."

"Elena," I say.

"You have to mean it," she interrupts, suddenly very serious. She takes the empty glass from my hand and sets it on the table. She stands in front of me and looks me in the eyes, her beautiful brown eyes, so fucking impossible to read, studying me expectantly. "Well? Go on. Do it."

I step even closer to her. I smell my shampoo on her hair and feel the rise and fall of her chest against mine as she breathes. I gently cradle her cheeks in my hands and look into her eyes as I force every ounce of my consciousness into hers.

What do I say to her? What are the right words to say so I don't make this even worse?

Fuck.

"Elena," I solemnly vow. "There is nothing that would make me happier than knowing that you are making your own choices, even if you don't agree with me."

Neither of us breathes or blinks or moves.

"Well?" I finally ask. "Do you feel different?"

She blinks. She swallows.

"Elena?" I tentatively say.

"Gross! Ew! Get away from me, you jerk!"

I flash across the room and stand as far away from her as I can get, against the wall, my hands help up.

"Damon," she flashes next to me. "I'm so sorry. I thought you'd realize I was kidding."

I glare at her. "That wasn't funny."

She smiles at me, biting her bottom lip as she tries not to laugh. "Come on. That was a little bit funny."

"Goddammit, Elena. This is serious."

"It is," she agrees. "Very serious. And so am I." She wraps her arms around my neck. She licks and kisses and nips with blunt teeth. "I'm sorry. Please forgive me."

"No."

"Damon," she says, her fingers creeping up underneath my shirt.

"There is nothing funny about any of this."

She pinches my nipple as the tip of her tongue dips delicately into my ear.

"I'm not laughing," she says.

"I need to know I'm doing right by you," I whisper.

"Maybe doing right by me means you're here, right now, right by me," she says. "Maybe that's what you're supposed to do."

"Elena," I whisper.

"Kiss me," she says. "Kiss me like you mean it."

Yes ma'am.


	9. I'll Be Home For Christmas

_A/N: Like Damon (as he admitted in 12 Days of Christmas), I have a penchant for melancholy Christmas songs. I could be way off-script here, but I've decided I need to know when and why Damon flips his humanity switch, which obviously occurs sometime __after__ his meeting with Stefan and Lexi in New Orleans in 1942 and __before__ 1953, when he was in Mystic Falls and killed several people, including the resident "Uncle" Joseph Salvatore. This is my current working theory. Please feel free to disagree or offer a better explanation. This story is a post Christmas-gusher and un-betaed, so the mistakes, misfortunes and boring bits are all my fault. But I hope you enjoy it anyway. _

* * *

**I'll Be Home for Christmas (If Only In My Dreams)**

_Christmas Eve, 1943_

It's the song. It plays all the time, bleeding out of shops and houses, this melancholy little tune that makes all the women tear up: _Christmas Eve will find me where the love-light gleams. I'll be home for Christmas, if only in my dreams. _I wonder if she can hear Bing's crooning, or is she beyond that now?

I take a long swallow from the bourbon bottle and sit on the snow-covered ruins. I'm not sure which is worse, knowing that Katherine's trapped and suffering, or imagining that she's so far gone she can't feel anything anymore.

I've asked anyone I could find who might have answers. It's all speculation, but everyone agrees the first weeks would've been a brutal struggle for dominance, as older vampires attacked and drained the younger ones, prolonging the inevitable. I know she was the strongest, which in some ways is reassuring, but that also means it took longer for her to stop feeling the pain.

It's why I came back this time. The song. When I returned from Egypt, it was everywhere, and all I could think about was coming here. I stopped by the house because I have every right to be there whenever I want. It's my goddamn house. Mine and Stefan's. Joseph gets to live there, leaching off a family trust and feeling superior and self-righteous as he raises his family with our money, but it only technically belongs to him, which he well knows and resents. Christ, he reminds me of Father, and his son is the spitting imagine of Stefan at that age. The place is full of ghosts, so I lurked at the windows but didn't go in and ruin their holiday.

I don't have or need mistletoe, but there is snow. She'd like it, I think. Big, fat flakes that blanket the world in a soothing white stillness. I love the snow, now that the cold doesn't bother me. Not like that last Christmas I was alive, when I was still away at war, and we huddled together at night, trying to stay warm without proper tents or wood for fires or enough blankets to go around. Now, the snow softens the edges and makes even the ruins of this church beautiful. I love that it muffles sound so not everything's so loud all the damn time. I swear, I spent that first year just trying to function without my fingers stuck in my ears. I know it would've been different if things had gone according to plan and I'd been with her.

Why didn't Katherine tell me? When I woke up by the quarry, why wasn't Stefan surprised to find me there with him?

Christ.

I swallow more bourbon and wish I'd nicked a second bottle. Maybe even a third. At the rate this one's going, it won't last until dawn, and I need it to.

I followed him Egypt. I didn't go officially. It wasn't the Salvatore brothers against the World at War because Lexi thinks he's better off alone than with me, eating camels in the desert and holding onto his humanity by his bloody fingernails.

She thinks she understands Stefan better than I do, and she thinks she knows me, but all she sees is what she wants to see, in both of us. She's as bad as Father.

I never speak about the war, not then and not now, but I hated every single, awful second. Hated it enough to say I wasn't going back even though I knew I was risking not only shame and humiliation, and I got plenty of both, but also public execution for being a traitor to my country's Glorious Cause. I didn't care. I said "I quit" with a smile, like it was nothing more to me than a game, because I knew that would make Father the most angry. And I vowed I would never again kill because someone told me to.

I've taken plenty of lives since then, but for my own reasons. Some, admittedly, are better reasons than others, but they've all been _my_ kills.

But I was going to go back to war, subject myself to the tyranny of other men, for Stefan. How does a person who can't handle a little blood on his fingers in a crowded bar plan to drive an ambulance on the front lines? What is wrong with Lexi for thinking this is some kind of atonement, and what is wrong with Stefan for listening to her bullshit? That's the thing with Stefan, though. Such a good little Catholic. So long as he flagellates on the back-end, so long as he really feels badly about whatever it is he's done, no matter how horrible, all will be forgiven.

Nothing has ever been Stefan's fault. And in New Orleans, when he said he was sorry for blaming me, I was just so happy to have him back that I didn't care about the implication that his Ripper days were somehow my doing. I'd gladly accept that blood on my hands if I thought it would help. But after two decades with Lexi, he's still not learned how to control himself. All he's learned is denial. It's not a question of _if_ Stefan falls off his sanctimonious animal-diet wagon; it's _when_ he'll fall off and how many he'll rip apart while he's down.

Sure, Lexi, I'm the one without balance. The fact that I haven't staked that meddling bitch in her sleep proves not only that I love my little brother, despite his choice of best friend, but also that I have considerable restraint.

Lexi said I would destroy him. Somehow, just my proximity would contaminate my saintly little brother, my vileness seeping into him. Guilt by association. She said the only thing to do was let him go, and so I did because I don't pretend to have any answers. All I know is that I love him, and I didn't want to be selfish and hurt him. Not again.

But I couldn't just leave him, like Lexi did. Throw him into a bloodbath and hope for the best because, as she said, he needs to see that blood and death are a part of life, not just horrors he leaves in his wake. Insanity. But Lexi was right about one thing: Stefan doesn't need me. I listened to him cry out for her, for his precious Lexi to help him, and I read his journal. I know it's an invasion of his privacy, but it was the only way I could think of to make sure he's okay.

He's not. I don't know that he ever will be because I think he actually believe his own lies. There's nothing more terrifying than a man who can sleep soundly at night because that is a creature beyond reason, and Stefan sleeps like the dead. He blames me. His journal is an indictment of all the ways I've wronged him, up to and including abandoning him on the front lines in Egypt. Melodramatic bullshit, most of it, and it's all my fault.

There isn't enough bourbon in the world to drown that out because it's almost impossible for a vampire to drink himself unconscious. I know because I keep trying.

I left him in 1864 to punish him. Because I was so angry. Because I wanted Katherine all to myself, and because I was shocked when I learned she wasn't. Only all I did was punish myself because Stefan did just fine without me. He happily ate through notable Mystic Falls citizens, leaving a mess for me to clean up. And again in 1912, I left him with the body of that girl, her head torn off and then smashed back on like she was a broken doll. I didn't want to follow after him and helplessly watch while he lost himself to the blood. I was weak that night thirty years ago, and I was wrong.

And I'm wrong for not telling him the truth about Katherine, but I'm not sorry he thinks she's dead and gone forever. Want to talk about rightful blame? It is, in fact, his fault she's trapped. He should feel really shitty about that because as far as he knows, he got her killed. And he told me that she compelled him, that he never really loved her. I don't believe him, not for a second, but after what he's done, he doesn't get to be waiting for her when this spell finally breaks. He doesn't get to hold her in his arms. At least not right away. We have forever stretching out before us, and maybe I'll have to accept that she will never be all mine, but for now, for the past eighty and the next seventy, she will be. Just mine.

I climbed the Great Pyramid one moonless night and realized how insignificant these decades are in the grand scheme. What of this life will still be standing in 4,000 years? Will I be around to see it, to watch the rise and fall of great empires? Will men still be cutting bloody swaths all over the earth? I sat on the very top stone until the sun rose over the desert, and of all the swirling thoughts trying to burst out of my mind, I kept returning to him. To Stefan. And how much better it would've been if he'd been sitting there next to me.

Everything is too much, the good and the bad. The sounds, the lights, the tastes. It's everything I felt when I was alive, only exponentially more. The pain and the pleasure, love and loss. I miss Katherine, but I miss him too.

God, I miss him.

It's right there. I can feel it: the switch. All the vampires and witches I've sought out speak of the mystical vampire switch, but like everything else, it's an enhanced version of what I knew to be true when I was human. I saw men in the war turn off their humanity so they could survive the things they'd done and would have to continue to do. Afterward, they only came alive during battle. They needed the intensity of the blood, the rush of power of life and death, and adrenaline coursing through their veins. I saw how much easier life could be, if only I gave in.

God, I wanted to. I hated my weak, silent tears I only shed when I was alone, in the dark. I hated the nightmares. I hated not being able to sleep unless I had my knife in my hand, how I needed my fingers curled into the worn leather hilt before I could close my eyes. Twice, I nearly stabbed my best friend when he was trying to wake me because I was screaming in my sleep. After the second time, I asked him to poke me with the butt of his gun, from a safe distance.

I hated myself.

But I always punish myself better than anyone else, and I wouldn't turn it off. I held onto the parts of me that mattered by writing letters to Stefan. I spent my days searching for the best thing I could write about, and doing that, thinking about Stefan, reminded me of what I would lose if I gave in, if I made the pain stop, because I knew he was back home waiting for me, and I promised him I would return.

I love Katherine, but I love Stefan too. Differently, but I've loved him longer, missed him even more. I need him. I need my little brother. Is that why Katherine turned him too? It's taken me eighty years that have seemed both endless and instantaneous, but maybe, just maybe, I understand why she did it. I came home for Christmas because of the damn song, and I thought it made me sad because I miss her so much. Only now that I'm here, I realize Stefan is my home, and he blames me. He loves me, but he hates me too.

I can't ever truly come home.

Eighty years. Eighty long years I've been strong. Waiting. Punishing myself so I'm worthy of her when I set her free and our life can finally begin. I've not made it easy and flipped the switch even though everyone tells me I won't feel any pain. I won't care about the guilt or the shame or the horror. I don't have to feel badly, not ever again. But nothing is without a price, and I don't want to be like those men I knew during the war, like Stefan with his hard eyes and his cold smile when he's fed so hard he tore someone into pieces.

I can't be that man.

I swallow the last of my bottle just as the sun begins to lighten the horizon. I bet Joseph's little boy is sneaking down the stairs right now, hoping for a glimpse of what Santa left in his stocking and under the tree. His face probably lights up just like Stefan's when he smiles. Those eyes, those same green eyes, the color of a stormy sea.

I throw the empty bottle as hard as I can, and I hear it shatter when it hits the ground off it in the distance.

I'm not a man. Not anymore.

Why am I making this so much harder than it has to be? Why not find comfort in physical pleasures and stop hurting so much? Why not be the monster he already thinks I am?

It's there. Right there. The switch. I could turn it off. All the pain, all my misery.

I could be free.

It's faster, I bet, and even more satisfying, than snapping a neck.


	10. Careful What You Wish For

_A/N: It's Christmas time, darnit, and I still feel festive, and so I decided BBB needed something a little more dialog-y and a little less dire. Well, it's still pretty dire because that's where the show is at the moment, and I intend to follow my own rules about staying in-canon. This takes place after "Oh Come All Ye Faithful." But I did my best to do a little work-around. Again, with me admitting to a gusher-of-a-story (I have no sense of moderation, none whatsoever) and no beta, and I'm really not entirely comfortable writing smuttiness. But I needed some. So... um... yeah. This is me, blushing and toeing the dirt. *awkwardly clears throat* Anywhoo, I hope you enjoy._

* * *

**Careful What You Wish For**

When I open my eyes, the sun is weakly shining through the many windows, mist still rising off the lake, and considering the embers are still glowing in the hearth and radiating heat, we haven't been asleep that long. I still sleep, but not like I used to. Like everything else, even being unconscious is different now that I'm a vampire.

I'm spooned against Damon's chest on the sofa, the way we slept all summer while Stefan was gone. Only then, we were both fully clothed, and Damon's legs weren't entwined with mine, and by the time I opened my eyes, he was always gone. He'd be in a chair with an open book, like he'd been sitting there all night, or I'd hear him in the kitchen making coffee. We never woke up together.

Last night, Jeremy and Bonnie and Professor Shane said they needed to retrieve some herbs and books from his office on campus. Even though he's already done so much for Jeremy, it was Bonnie who said it'd be safer if they all went and didn't leave Jeremy alone at the isolated lake house with two vampires he may or may not still want to kill.

For a second, as they pulled on jackets and found keys and asked if we needed anything when they were in town, I thought Damon was going to insist I go too. I know he's still not comfortable with all the implications of the sire-bond, what it means for us and how it's affecting me, most likely in ways I don't even realize. I saw it in his eyes, the moment when he gave in. I hate the pain I saw there, flashing across his face so quickly someone not paying attention might not have even seen it, before he made his face blank and nodded his goodbyes and, without a word, walked through the back door and out onto the pier.

"You going to be okay?" Bonnie asked me after Professor Shane and Jeremy went to start the car. She gently squeezed my hand. "Maybe this isn't a good idea."

"It's fine" I insisted. "I'm fine. We're both... fine."

She nodded, but I could tell she didn't believe me. "It always makes me nervous when you use that word," she murmured as she left.

I left him alone out there, staring at the water. I washed up the dishes from dinner. I refolded all the old quilts and afghans and returned them to the basket. I fluffed the pillows on the couch. I brushed and flossed my teeth even though I'm not even sure I have to do that anymore. I opened a bottle of wine and drank a glass. And then I cried just a little because I realized it was Jenna's favorite, and she and Ric must've left it the last time they were up here.

I got angry with myself for crying. Good grief. I didn't cry for so long, and now it feels like all I do is cry. I'm a super-fast, super-strong vampire, and I've turned into a weak, sniffling, cry-baby. After I splashed some cold water on my face, I drank a second glass of wine just to prove that I could without turning into a puddle of weepy girl on the kitchen floor.

I stalled for as long as I could, giving him the space and time I knew he needed, but in the end, I needed to be next to him more than I needed to let him be. I needed to breathe in his scent with every breath and have him close.

It was dark when I finally stepped outside, so dark I would've needed a flashlight if I were human. I walked at a slow pace to where he stood, still looking out over the water. He'd been standing, motionless, all this time.

"Hey," I said.

"Hey back," he said, echoing the first words we'd spoken to each other after he came back from New Orleans.

"It's late, Damon. Please come inside."

"I can't, Elena." He swallowed hard, loud enough for me to hear. And then he swallowed again. "I can't do this. You shouldn't be here. You don't belong with me."

"Damon," I protested. "We've been over this. I do!"

He shook his head. "No. You don't. Not like this." He shook his head again. "I deserve this. For all the women I've controlled, for all the times I've maneuvered and manipulated you, made choices for you. I deserve this."

"Damon," I said.

"No, it's true," he interrupted. "Cosmic justice. The fucking curse of actually getting what I wanted, which is you wanting nothing more than to make me happy, and it's a fucking nightmare."

I flinched at his harsh tone, the way his words spit out as sharp-edged and brutal as knives. Only I wasn't afraid for me because Damon, as always, hurts himself best.

Neither of us moved or spoke. It was long enough for me to acknowledge that it was cold, even though I don't feel the cold like I used to. I had so much I wanted to say. I wanted to comfort him and have him reassure me. I wanted to touch him, and feel his hands on me. But I didn't. I stayed perfectly silent and still. I didn't even breathe, which felt really strange and awesome, all at the same time. My lungs wanted to, maybe out of habit, and I missed not being able to smell him, but I don't need the air in my lungs. I could stand there and consciously not take a breath.

I waited while Damon fought some silent battle within himself.

I don't know whether he won or lost, but finally, after what felt like lifetimes, or maybe it was only minutes, his hand slowly reached for mine. He kissed my palm before holding it to his heart.

"Elena," he said, my name on his lips like a prayer.

* * *

We built a fire. He insisted, like before, that he be a gentleman. It's sweet and strange, Damon so worried about my virtue. But when I asked, embarrassed to look at him while I made my request, he reluctantly pulled his shirt over his head and handed it to me, the firelight leaving shadows on his chest.

"Change in the other room," he said, not looking at me.

When I came back, wearing only my panties and his shirt, he was stretched out on the couch wearing only his jeans. I heard him suck in a breath when he saw me, but he didn't say anything, just held open the blanket so I could crawl in next to him. I had one glorious moment when I rubbed my cheek against his bare chest and tasted one nipple with the tip of my tongue before he flipped me, so my back was to him.

"You kill me," he whispered into my hair, even as he wrapped one of his legs around mine. "You fucking kill me."

"Damon," I whispered back.

"No," he snapped. "No fucking talking. Go to sleep."

* * *

"Good morning," he whispers.

"How long have you been awake?"

"I didn't go to sleep."

I shift a little so I can see him, and I wish his face was the happy face I woke up to before, when we didn't know. This face, still too beautiful to be fair, is thoughtful and sad. "You didn't sleep at all?"

He shakes his head and smooths my hair back. "I held you. Watched you sleep."

"Sounds boring," I say with a smile.

He smiles, but it's sad too. "It was one of the best nights of my entire life."

"Damon."

"No, really," he interrupts. "It was. Go ahead and laugh."

I shake my head. "I don't want to laugh. It's really..."

"Pathetic? Weak? Retarded?"

"Sweet," I say. Something tells me that's not a word many people use to describe him.

"Maybe there's something to be said for finite amounts of time. Maybe knowing that something can't last does make it more precious."

"I remember being willing to die all the time," I say. "Wanting to die because I thought my death would mean something to the people I love. I couldn't see past the next minute, most of the time. Getting by. Pushing through. Waiting for the other shoe to drop. But now that I am, in fact, dead, I just can't remember why I felt that way. So I'm not sure I'd use the word 'precious.'"

"That's the thing," Damon whispers, tucking a stray piece of hair behind my ear. "Technically, yes, our bodies are dead. But in all the ways that matter, we're more alive than we ever were as human. We feel everything so much more."

I turn so I'm facing him, half hanging off the couch. He opens his mouth, probably to wave me off, but before he can protest or list all the reasons why not, I undo his pants and reach inside so I can ease him out. Even half-erect, he overflows my hands.

"Elena," he moans.

I can't help but study it, this piece of him that feels far too silky for something that's been around for so long. It's not like I've never seen a man before. It's not even that I've never seen Damon. We've been together, over and over, these past few days. It's been buried inside me. I've had it in my mouth. I've licked and touched it before. But not like this. Not with the sun shining in the windows and us with nowhere to be.

It was different with Matt. We were kids groping in the dark, both literally and metaphorically. He never made me come. We had what I suppose counts as sex a couple of times, but both times, I had to ask him to stop before he was finished because it just hurt too much. By the time he was ready to get serious and make it work for me, I already knew he was much better as my friend, not my boyfriend.

With Stefan, for all the intensity, he was afraid. Afraid of himself, I think, but he said he was afraid of hurting me. He was patient and gentle and generous, the perfect lover for a 17-year old girl, but it was very one-sided. Our intimacies weren't fair, and he was always too scared to let himself go, to really enjoy it.

Damon is different.

He gasps as I gently play with his foreskin, easing it back before letting it go, until it stays back on its own. "Stefan had this too," I say, rubbing the tender skin between my fingers and watching him shudder. "But Matt didn't."

I trace his head with one finger, noting how beautiful it is. Leave it to Damon to have a beautiful penis, thick, with that graceful curve, the head plump and almost friendly looking. I circle once, twice, before catching the shining drop of precum that bubbles out with my finger. I bring my fingertip to my mouth and lick it off, surprised to find it doesn't taste like much of anything, my action making Damon moan.

"Surely you're not seeing anything you haven't seen before," he says with a gasp.

"I haven't seen you. I haven't really looked. I was... preoccupied... last time." He groans when I cup his balls, squeezing them and rolling them in my hand, feeling the weight of them. "You know you're beautiful, but I'm going to say it anyway: good golly you're beautiful."

"Most people use manlier descriptions," he teases while I throw back the blanket and struggle to pull off his jeans.

"But you're really not very manly," I say down by his feet. He's always wearing boots, but his bare toes are vulnerable looking and delicate, long and nicely shaped. I glance up and see him making a face, and I immediately back-pedal. "I didn't mean that. You are super-manly. I just mean, you're smaller than I used to think. Before I touched you, felt you with my own hands. You seem so much bigger than you actually are. You're not that tall, you have delicate hands. You have surprisingly lovely toes." I lick one of them to make my point.

"Way to make a guy feel good," he grumbles. "I have nice toes?"

"Oh yes," I say with a smile, my hand once again moving up to stroke him. "But you have many other... nice bits... too." Damon closes his eyes and breathes through his mouth as my hand continues and I lean over and gently suck just the tip into my mouth, swirling my tongue around it. "This?" I say, pleased that my actions make him bite into his lower lip and push his head back against the pillow. "This is disproportionally large. This is much bigger than it should be."

"Are you teasing me?" he incredulously asks.

"What? Me?" I stare up at him through my eyelashes, my mouth hovering just above his glossy head, wet with my spit. "Dare to tease a big, bad, scary vampire who could devour me in a second and never think twice about it?" I lower my mouth and continue licking and sucking him.

"I'm not that guy anymore," he pants. "And you're not so helpless anymore either."

It's like being doused with cold water.

He's right. I'm not. I'm not that girl. I'm not a girl at all.

I stop what I'm doing and sit up.

"I'm a monster now, aren't I?" I quietly ask. "Jeremy's right to hate me, to want to kill me. He doesn't need a Hunter's Mark for that. Vampires have given him plenty of reasons. I've given him reasons..."

Damon covers his hips with the blanket and pulls me back into his chest.

"I'm sorry," he says, kissing my hair. "But this is good. Not that you're upset. That's never good. But things were..." he sighs. "Getting out of hand. I'm supposed to be gentleman with you."

I bury my face in his chest, enjoying the feel of his skin against my cheeks, blinking so the tears don't spill over. "I hate this," I finally say. "I hate feeling so out of control all the time. I hate going from one extreme to another. I'm all happy and sexed-up, and the next second I hate myself and I'm crying. I hate that the only time it doesn't completely suck is when..." A laugh bursts out of me, the sound choked and awkward and too loud because this is the opposite of funny. "Sucking. That's the only times it doesn't completely suck: when I'm sucking you or sucking the life out of someone."

Damon strokes my hair and rubs soothing circles on my back. "Death is who we are," he finally says. "It's what we do. It's how we were made. But we don't have to be monsters. You're the one who showed me that, Elena. You. We accept that we're vicious, magically-created killing machines, and then we choose not to be."

"You make it sound so simple."

"Simple? Yes. Easy? No." He quietly laughs, a sound that's more sad than anything. "You would know better than anyone how not easy it is. You've seen me. You've always seen me, all of me, and you've seen me struggle and fail. I'm failing now. Holding you, being with you, is a comfort I shouldn't have because it feels so fucking good. I could take comfort in your arms and forget, at least for a while, that it's wrong." He shakes his head. "It's only easy when I'm losing myself in the blood." He sighs. "And living like that, with your humanity turned off? That's its own kind of hard."

"Deep thoughts, by Damon Salvatore," I say.

"Don't tell anyone," he says. "I have my reputation as a shallow, selfish prick to uphold. I'd hate to disappoint the kiddies."

"Why do you do that?" I ask. "Why do you let people assume the worst about you?"

"Didn't we already have this conversation once before?" he asks, and then he's quiet for so long that I don't think he's going to answer me. "Because it's just as true as anything else," he finally says. "I'm both the best and the worst parts of me, and everything in between, simultaneously. We're all good and bad, at the same time, every second of every day."

"You are," I begin, not sure of the right word to use. Damon doesn't accept compliments well, and I don't want to make him uncomfortable or drive him away from me and make him want to kill someone. "You astonish me," I finally say.

While he's distracted with that, I slip my hand under the blanket and stroke him once more, gently this time, and catch another drop on my finger that I lick away before reaching for him again. "And I never did this sort of thing before. Not savoring it like this, not in the sunshine. I mean, obviously, I've..."

"Let's not go into details," he interrupts. "I think we'll both be much happier if I don't share mine and you don't share yours."

"Please, talk about unfair bargain," I say. "I've been with three people, and you've probably been with three people at the same time."

"None of the others have mattered," he whispers, gathering me closer to him. He gently eases my hand away from his penis and brings it to his mouth. First he kisses the back of my hand, then the palm. "I passed the time," he explains, kissing my thumb, then my index finger. "I was waiting. I didn't love any of those people. I did what I did because it felt good in the moment." He sucks my middle finger into his mouth and gently bites it. I immediately feel the flood of wet heat and tension in my lower belly, as if he were kissing and licking and touching me there, not on my hand. "Nothing. No one." He licks along my ring finger, swirling his tongue around the tip. "Is anywhere even close to what I feel when I'm with you." He kisses my pinkie finger and holds my hand over his heart. "You are the only Elena."

He shifts so I'm laying down, his hard erection pressed against my hip. His fingers tease the hem of his shirt that I slept in. I know, logically, that he's seen me and felt me and tasted me. There isn't a single secret place he's not already explored. But it feels different somehow, now, on the sofa in the lake house, rather than in his big bed. I squirm and try to look away, and if I could still blush, I know my face would be flaming. But he won't let me.

"No," he whispers. "Be here. Be with me."

He pulls his shirt over my head and tosses it aside, looking at me as if he's never seen me before. He leans over so he can kiss me, his mouth lingering on my nipples, my neck, my lips.

"Damon," I beg, my breath coming out in gasps.

"You are so beautiful," he says before his tongue does something wicked and wonderful to first one breast, and then the other. "Don't be afraid."

He slips one finger into me, and then a second, spreading the wetness around my swollen lips, my clit. It's my turn to gasp with open-mouth breaths and lean back into the pillow.

"I love you, Elena," he says as he hooks my legs over my arms, leaving me wide open and exposed to him. I'm panting and writhing against his fingers and I know I should worry because he's seeing everything, all of me, all at once, and the sun is shining through the window. But I can't think about that. Not when Damon's lips are teasing my clit before he nibbles it delicately.

"Damon," I beg again, only this time I'm asking for something completely different. And he knows. He knows just want I need.

He thrusts into me with moan. We both take a moment to just feel him, there, inside me, holding each other, before he starts to move. He keeps his pubic bone tight against my clit. He feels huge inside me this way, stretching and filling me, and the friction is so good that I can't help but squirm against him, hearing myself moan. He dips his head so he can kiss me, and I taste myself on his lips until he bites into his tongue and then I can only taste him.

It's too much and not enough, Damon filling me every way he possibly can, possessing me. All of me. His blood is tingling my tongue when I feel it, the slow-building explosion, and I cry out into him as I come, gasping and holding him as closely as I can.

* * *

I am awoken by my own scream. It's his name on my lips, lingering in the still air, but I am alone in my bed, my fingers embarrassingly buried in my sodden pussy. My body is still rippling with the intensity of my orgasm as I listen carefully, the way he taught me, and identify all the sounds the house is making. I am, in fact, alone.

I straighten my pajama bottoms and wipe my wet hand against the sheets. I'm wearing his shirt. I steal a fresh one from the Boarding House everyday, so it smells like him, but he's rapidly running out of shirts to steal.

Damon sent me away. He didn't want me.

The tears, when they start, aren't unexpected. I keep waking up like this, alone and horny and crying out for him. And every time, when I realize it was all just a dream, a terrible, horrible dream because it didn't happen and he won't let it, maybe not ever, that's when I cry. I don't even bother wiping them away anymore. I let them come, streaming silently down my face as I reach for the bourbon bottle that's waiting for me next to the bed. I swallow it down like it's water.


	11. Reflection of Postmodern Symmetry

_A/N: Klaus' POV following the massacre/murder in "Oh Come All Ye Faithful." Extra buckets of gratitude for my beta-extraordinaire, CreepingMuse, who is always honest and doesn't let me stop until I've gotten it right. _

* * *

**Reflection of Postmodern Symmetry **

The door bangs hollowly against the wall as I open it. Out of habit, I stand quite still and listen for potential danger. The house, the house I prepared for my family and filled with treasures I've gathered from all over the world, is dark and empty. It was intended to be our home, but it's a mausoleum.

I am alone.

Breaking my mother's curse was meant to be the solution. To become truly immortal. To create others like me, to raise my army. To never be alone again. But there is no loyalty, only lies and betrayal. The last of my hybrids made from the last of my doppelganger blood, and they were traitors, the whole bloody lot of them. Tyler Lockwood presumed to rise up and lead them against me.

Everyone always turns against me.

In the end, it's kill or be killed, but I took no pleasure in their slaughter. Werewolves, as a whole, aren't the most civilized companions. Appalling tempers. My hybrids were young and ill-mannered and crude. But they were mine. I freed them from their pain, the ungrateful savages. I gave them the gift of balance, creatures not bound to anyone or anything but me. Was a scrap of loyalty too much to ask?

They were supposed to be my family, the family I made of my own blood, and now it's drying all over my face and hands, ruining my clothes and congealing in my hair.

I should shower, but instead I fetch a fresh bottle of champagne. 1928 Krug, one of the finest vintages ever produced, which I stole from Buckingham Palace at the ball to commemorate the end of World War II. I need to cleanse my palate after the cheap, warmed bottle from the holiday party in town. I wander rooms full of my beautiful possessions, my shoes clicking loudly on the wooden floors, echoing in the too-quiet house. I don't bother with a glass, just drink from the bottle, the taste of blood lingering on my lips. The champagne reminds me of Caroline, artfully balancing crispness and effervescence and just the right amount of sweet.

Beauty is all about balance.

She called my snowflake lonely, rather than beautiful. I didn't bother with my postmodern explanation, just accepted her compliment. Perhaps because I wanted it to be a compliment even if I didn't believe she intended it that way. I'm well aware Caroline doesn't much care for me. She can be quite charming, especially when she's intent on distracting from the latest failed effort to thwart me, but pretense doesn't suit her. It's one of the reasons I can't get her out of my head.

I don't fancy analyzing my own recent work, so it's possible Caroline saw the truth. Perhaps my snowflake is lonely, its beautiful symmetry threatened by a riot of darkness. Art shows the world your soul and asks them to look and judge and point out the flaws. But we subject ourselves to such scrutiny and indignity because maybe we'll share a connection, if only for a moment. We all crave acceptance, the feeling of being _known_. I may be immortal, but I am certainly not immune to those desires. But there's a reason I don't trust people: they're untrustworthy, especially the ones you love.

And yet we continue to love. Again and again, we leave ourselves vulnerable knowing the consequences of love are inevitable tears and bloodshed. We can't help ourselves. So I understand why Rebekah fell in love with Stefan, why part of her loves him still, even though he's betrayed and rejected her. I fell for him too, a little. More than a little, despite everything he's done. I can smell him, that scent that is so particular to him. It's soothing and pleasant, Stefan's scent heavy in my nose, even when he's broken into my house and would've taken something that belongs to me if he had found it.

Stefan and I have an affinity, a rare quality and the only reason I haven't killed him for all the pain and trouble he's caused. I'd dagger him for a few decades if I could for riffling so thoughtlessly through my letters. Did I touch his precious list when we were in Chicago? These are my letters. I've killed people for them because there's something so honest contained within the fragile pages. Like my paintings, love letters bare one soul to another. They're pleading for connection, to not be alone. They weren't written to me, but these love letters are mine.

Just as the hybrids were mine, and Tyler Lockwood attempted to claim them as his own. For that, he will suffer.

Rather fortuitously, for all his egregious faults, Tyler loves his mother. Like my siblings banded together against the brutality of our father, I suspect Tyler and Carol had to unite because of the late Mayor Lockwood. I never had the pleasure of meeting him, but a werewolf whose curse hasn't triggered means he was a pompous ass and a bully who, without doubt, terrorized his son and wife.

I rather liked Carol Lockwood. There's something both ridiculous and pathetic about a woman past her prime who doesn't realize it. She made her proverbial deals with assorted devils with politely duplicitous smiles. But she loved her son. She loved Tyler to her last, water-filled breath. Such devotion to family is undeniably a beautiful thing.

People will think she was intoxicated and slipped. Quite the embarrassing scandal, really. But Tyler will know it was me. Killing her will be much more painful than killing him would've been, and ultimately more satisfying to me. How well I know what it's like to live bearing the guilt of a mother's death, and I intend to see that he lives a long, long life.

Tyler is an only child. Now he's an orphan. Betrayed by a trusted comrade. An alpha ripped from his pack. A boy isolated from his friends. A lover estranged from the girl he desires. Tyler Lockwood will live in his own grand mausoleum completely and utterly alone.

There's a beautiful symmetry to that.

* * *

_Author's Post Script: For all you history buffs, 1928 Krug was indeed served to King George VI at the first royal event held at Buckingham Palace after WWII. Apparently, it was the grapes that year that made such exquisite champagne. I chose it for several reasons, but firstly because Klaus has a thing for stealing from royalty (Caroline's bracelet was a princess', and the wine Rebekah brings to Damon and Sage's mind-reding party was stolen from a queen). _


	12. You're Welcome

_A/N: Expanded Stefan POV from "Catch Me If You Can." Huge thanks, always and eternally, to CreepingMuse. And no thanks at all to Stefan, who never cooperates when I'm trying to write him. _

* * *

**You're Welcome**

"You don't know what I look like when I'm not in love with you," I tell her, knowing Damon can hear me.

Not only is it true, but the shocked look of hurt on her face makes me smile. Because dammit, she was the only one who ever made me feel... Alive isn't the right word. But she made me feel like maybe I could be the person I've always wanted to be. She believed in me. Had faith in _that _Stefan, and I loved her for it. But I don't want her to love me simply because she loves everyone. Because she loves him.

"I'll let Damon know you stopped by."

I don't think she realizes he can hear perfectly well from the basement. All those times we kissed and made love and whispered to each other in my bed, he heard everything as clearly as if he'd been in the room with us. Every moan. Every "I love you." She didn't know, or she never would've done it.

I am not like Elena with her ridiculous ability to love and forgive. Elena, who, even as a vampire, doesn't have a vindictive bone in her body. My words are calm and neutral, but my underlying tone is as sharp as the stake I used out in the woods to stab him. Over and over, spilling his blood onto the earth until the ground turned a muddy red.

It felt good, I won't deny that. To feel the snap of his neck. To see Elena's horrified eyes. To start draining him before she was too far away with Jeremy to not hear it, to not smell his blood. The rich tang of it in my nose as I reopened wounds and watched it soak into the dirt.

For a split second, I can see it in her eyes. Her need to argue. Like maybe she'll yell at me, or even make a run for it and try to get down the stairs. To comfort him. I want her to fight with me. But the plucky Elena I fell in love with, the girl who went traipsing through woods full of werewolves on a full moon to find me, doesn't appear. That Elena is gone and is replaced by a girl who just looks weary.

The Elena who's in love with Damon is broken, and that makes me smile too.

She just nods, her brown eyes wet with unshed tears. "Thank you," she whispers with an annoying sincerity. She shuts the door so softly behind her that I don't think I would've heard it if I were human. I listen until her car pulls onto the road and heads back towards town before I flash to the bar.

I yank my hair until my scalp burns and resist the urge to find someone and drink until I truly don't care. It'd be so easy to get lost again, but I can't. I won't.

I'm too on edge to bother with a glass, so I grab a decanter and drink in greedy swallows, Damon's favorite bourbon going down smooth as silk and leaving trails of heat on my tongue and in my throat.

But all the liquor in the world isn't enough to distract me from the ache in my chest, so I pull Damon's phone from my pocket and access his voicemail again. I hear Elena, only not the defeated girl who just drove away. I hear _her_. That voice that should sound just like Katherine but somehow doesn't, so full of goodness, of everything I've ever wanted to hear. I listen while that Elena's voice tells Damon how much she wants to be close to him and how much she misses him. I listen to her tell my brother she loves him.

Why does she always know the exact right thing to say? How will I be that Stefan without her voice in my ear to guide me? How can I listen to her tell my brother all the right things for the rest of our lives?

I hate him.

"You don't need to be such a fucking dick," Damon accuses from the basement, his voice rasping. When I don't answer, just stand there holding his decanter in one hand and his phone in the other, he adds, "At least share my bourbon with me before you go."

That's a good idea. I should go somewhere else. Anywhere else. Away from him and the sound of his labored breathing and stifled moans. But I'm afraid I'll hurt someone right now, so I listen to her voicemail again before heading downstairs.

I stand outside the cell door, watching him through the bars, his torn shirt and blood oozing onto the filthy floor. I always just dump him onto the floor, but Damon, when it was my turn to be locked up, didn't do that. He was so mad at me, and he wanted Elena for himself, but he spoke gently to me. He cleaned the blood from my face. He laid me on a bed. He kept vigil outside the door all night. Even when I was under Klaus' compulsion and ripping, he couldn't leave me to rot.

Love is Damon's weakness. It always has been, from when we were boys, when he sheltered me and protected me. From Father. From the tutors. From myself. He was so hell-bent on saving me any pain or even discomfort.

"Do I have to engrave a fucking invitation?" he asks. "Or do you plan to stand out there and drink all my booze just to be mean?"

"Could be fun," I say, taking a leisurely swallow just to piss him off. "And I'm supposed to tell you Elena was here."

He tries to swallow around his tongue, his lips dry and cracked. He looked at me before, lifting his head, wanting to find Kol, to fight. But either he's too weak now or he's not wasting the energy because he just lays there on the floor. He doesn't even open his eyes.

"She forgets..." He swallows again and licks his lips. "That we can hear."

You forget that I can hear too, brother.

I heard him in the woods, asking Jeremy to kill him. I heard the plea in his voice. That tone we've all had, at one point or another, when it all gets to be too much. When we're too weak to end it ourselves. Because he'd rather die than hurt her.

I hate him for that too.

"She feels shitty enough. I won't ask her to let me out." He coughs weakly and grimaces, holding onto the oozing holes I left in his abdomen.

"Can't risk it. The last time you were in here, you killed Zach."

"Let's not compare body counts, brother," he says with a sigh. "Pots and kettles. Glass houses and big fucking rocks."

"You want me to stab you again?" I snap. "Because I will."

He smiles. He actually smiles, obnoxious prick, even though his eyes are still closed. "Might be good for you," he say. "I know you want to."

You don't know me, Damon. Fuck you.

I open the door and step inside. Crouch down and lift his head to the decanter's edge. I intentionally pour too fast. I let some spill onto his chest, enjoying the way he hisses as it burns into his wounds. But he doesn't complain. He just sips carefully so he doesn't choke. His head drops to the floor with a thud like dead weight as soon as I'm no longer supporting it.

"You've lost so much blood, you just might black out."

I mean to sound cruel. Patronizing, at the very least. But my words come out softly. Gentle. And after I say it, I realize I mean it. I wish he would pass out. So he won't have spend the night in pain, only his thoughts for company in this miserable cell.

"Dare to dream, Stef."

I swallow from the bottle again, watching his labored breathing, staring at the holes in his shirt. Some are from Jeremy's bullets, but some are my doing.

I remember the winter he had the flu. I was ten? Eleven maybe? His fever burned for days. He was delirious, moaning and whimpering and crying out for our mother. I thought he was invincible, my big brother, my savior, and seeing him so weak terrified me. Father had forbidden me to go near Damon's room, lest I catch it too, but at night, I'd crawl into his bed. His skin was so hot against mine, like standing too close to the fire. He breathed like this then, heavy and wet, and I put my ear against his chest, heard his lungs struggle to get enough air.

"You did the right thing," he finally says.

I'd been focused on the bloody mess of his chest, so I'm startled when I look up and see his eyes open and looking at me. They're so blue, burning from the deathly pallor of his face. He looks into my soul, as he always has, those eyes piercing through all my defenses. And I hate him for it.

He gestures weakly to his ruined shirt. "You don't need to add this to your fucking guilty conscious."

"I wasn't going to," I say.

He nods, just a slight movement of his head, but I can tell he doesn't believe me. And I think, for the first time, I'm grateful.

"Too bad Rebekah only gets revenge-fucked."

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Oh brother," he says, once more closing his eyes. "Let's pretend for two fucking seconds that I know you. You're pissed, so you stabbed me nearly to death. And well done. Needed to happen. You're hurt, so you run to Rebekah. Just don't tear anyone apart, okay?" He coughs weakly.

"Maybe you didn't hear me upstairs? I don't care, Damon. Elena means nothing to me."

Maybe she did. Once. Already ancient history. So what if her voice on the other end of the phone is the only thing that kept me from losing myself? So what if I loved her more than anything, even the oblivion of the blood? That was then. She's nothing now. Just a necessary piece on the chess board. She's Klaus' precious doppelganger. That's all.

It doesn't matter that she had sex with Damon. That she's in love with Damon. Because I don't care.

I don't.

"You're a goddamn beautiful liar, Stefan, but I know you. Sleep with Rebekah, be a dick to Elena, stake me some more, whatever. But don't go all Ripper on me. Things are fucked up enough, and you'll just feel worse after."

"You're wrong about that," I say. I can't possibly feel worse than I do now.

"Trust me," he says. "You can always feel worse."

I snort and drink again. "Like you know anything."

"You were fucking brutal upstairs, and Elena Gilbert is the best friend you'll ever have. It's easier to feel angry than hurt. I wrote that book, brother. So fuck you 'cause I know plenty."

He coughs again, holding onto his chest as if he fears it might rip apart. "Fuck," he says, his voice weak. "That hurt. Go away so I don't yell at you anymore."

"But this is just starting to get fun," I reply, even though we both know I don't mean it.

"One more drink for the road," he says. "Then bury your sorrows between Rebekah's legs. Just don't say I didn't warn you when that comes back to bite you. And not in the good way. Been there, done that."

Part of me wants to just slam the door and walk away. Prove how wrong he is. Show him how much I don't care. But as usual, he's right. Damon is always right, and I hate him for that too. And if I did leave him here while I lost myself in the blood, he'd find me. Drag me back from the edge. He'd still love me. Because that's what Damon does.

I hold his head again so he can drink, this time pouring slowly so none of it spills. He wraps one hand weakly around my ankle and squeezes. Almost like a hug, if we hugged each other instead of stabbing. When he nods to tell me he's done, I gently lower his head back to the floor, smoothing his hair off his forehead.

"You have my phone," he whispers. It's not a question.

"You can't call her."

"No," he says. "Just..." He sighs. "Can you play a saved message for me? You can have it back. Just... Can you play a message? Please?"

His eyes open, and they're so blue, and he looks at me like he did before he left for the war. Before Katherine. I can't deny him her voice. Not when I know better than anyone the power it holds.

I hate them both.

I access his messages and hold the phone to his ear and try not to hear Elena tell him she loves him.

"One more time?" I quietly ask when it's done because I shouldn't begrudge him that. Especially not now.

"No," he whispers. "That's enough."

I know better. It will never be enough. I wish I had thought to save a voicemail, the sound of her unflinching and unconditional love to carry in my pocket. I was a fool to think I'd get to hear it forever.

"Go," he says.

"I'll be back first thing in the morning."

"Take your time," he says with a smile. "I'm not going anywhere."

The door shuts with a metallic finality that makes me flinch, and I'm almost to the stairs when I hear him whisper, "Thank you, Stef."

I hate my fucking brother. For thanking me after I enjoyed stabbing him and dumping his body onto the floor. I fucking hate him. I hate that I have to blink a few times and clear my throat before I can reply.

"You're welcome."

* * *

_A/N: If you'd like to see Stefan have revenge-sex with a different Original, check out my one-shot, "Guilty Pleasures." And if you can't get enough Damon and Elena, even though they can't physically be together right now, head over to JWAB's "Don't Speak," which also takes place during "Catch Me If You Can." You won't regret it 'cause she's an awesome writer._


	13. Sugar Sugar

_A/N: This chapter is for Trogdor19, who said I couldn't do it (and now has to suck an old, sweaty sock), and for all the people who've said I make them cry. Since I suspect the proverbial shit is about to hit the fan in Mystic Falls, let's take a five minute time-out (following "A View To A Kill") for some fluffy puppies and rainbows and honeyed sweetness. No beta, so blame me for all misfortunes and mistakes, but I hope you enjoy anyway. _

_*cue Sugar Sugar by the Archies*_

* * *

**Sugar Sugar**

Why do we even fucking bother with our intricate plans that inevitably contain more goddamn linchpins than sense? Everything that could've possibly gone wrong did, in fact, go wrong. But by the grace of God and the sheer force of will of one plucky big sister, who's in seriously deep shit for pulling such a reckless and retarded stunt, today wasn't an epic failure. Halle-fucking-lujahs. About goddamn time.

Sure, it sucks I missed the Kol-kabob in the kitchen, which must've been an even better sight than the headless hybrid on the porch. And if I think too much about Elena and Jeremy, newborn vampire and baby Hunter, going after an Original alone, someone's going to die a painful, bloody death. So I'm not going to think about it right now. I'll save that visual for a rainy day. But Kol is gone, so I'm no longer locked in the basement on the verge of desiccation. I still want to kill Jeremy, but in the usual way because he's a fucking punk. And his mark is complete. And Elena is upstairs in my shower.

I feel fucking magnanimous, which is why I'm sitting here on the sofa across from Stefan, rather than sudsing her back. But our house, once again, is command central. Bonnie and Jeremy are upstairs locked in one of the rooms because a not unexpected side-effect of a Hunter killing thousands, perhaps tens of thousands, of vampires in one staking is that he's back to wanting us all dead. The troops have been notified, and come morning, we'll spring Professor Shady from the clink and take this Race for the Cure on the road. Who's ready for some sing-alongs and license plate bingo?

Fuck. Just the thought of it makes me finish the rest of my drink in a single swallow.

When I hear the shower turn off in my bathroom, and I have to admit I'm loving that she still hasn't claimed her own room in our house full of empty bedrooms, I snatch Stefan's glass from his hand and saunter over to the bar for refills.

"Don't you think it's interesting," I say while I pour, still not looking at Stefan. "That I made an off-hand comment to Klaus this morning about not Hulking my way out of the dungeon, and then, mere hours later, Jeremy rips off his shirt Hulk-style in our living room?"

"What?" Stefan says as I hand him his drink. He looks incredulously confused, like I just told him they no longer sell hair gel. "What are you talking about?"

"Jeremy," I say. "Jeremy Gilbert? He's all buff and shit. Do you think we could talk Bonnie into spelling him green for the next Founder's party?"

"Damon, be serious."

"I fucking am," I say with a smile. "Not permanently, of course. Just for an evening. I think green would really bring out his eyes, and how fantastic would it be for him to say, 'You won't like me angry,' before tearing off his shirt in front of all the proverbial stuffed shirts? This town needs some more monsters."

"Damon," Stefan warns.

"Now that I'm picturing it," I interrupt. "I'm so tapping that the next time I feel like batting for the other team, if you know what I mean."

I raise a single eyebrow and offer my most lascivious grin. He looks like he either wants to vomit or hit me. Maybe both. Fucking hypocrite 'cause I know he's nursing a wee-tiny flame for Klaus. It's fucking embarrassing to have an Original groupie for a brother.

"Oh yeah," I say with a nod. "You know _exactly_ what I mean. Oooh, or maybe I'll make myself the cheese in a grilled-Gilbert sandwich. Doesn't that sound scrumptious? Being in between those two? Mmm mmm." I lick my lips.

"Damon, you sick bastard, she can hear you."

I smile, raising my glass to him. "I like to think this is not only entertaining for me, but also a valuable lesson for her about the acoustics of this house. I got the impression last night, you were a fabulous messenger boy, by the way, thanks so much, that you were less than forthcoming about how well vampires can hear."

"So help me," he begins, flashing up from his chair. His face is inches away from mine. His eyes turn red as the veins snake their way down his cheeks. "I will bleed you dry again, only this time..."

"Stefan," Elena quietly interrupts from the doorway. She's standing there in one of my shirts, a navy blue button-down, and her jeans. Her hair is wet and she's carrying her shoes and so help me, I don't think I've ever seen anyone more beautiful.

Stefan immediately backs away from me, his eyes returning to green.

"We both know he's kidding," Elena soothes. "He's just trying to get a rise out of you."

"He's disgusting," Stefan sneers, slamming his still-full drink down onto the table, sloshing my good bourbon onto the rug. "I'm going to bed."

"Goodnight, Stefan," Elena says as he passes her on his way to the stairs.

"Yeah, goodnight, baby brother," I say. "Sweet dreams."

"Fuck you," he mutters as he takes the stairs two at a time. I'm fairly certain even a human would've heard his slamming bedroom door.

"Damon," Elena scolds. She drops her shoes and flashes over to me. She's straddling my lap before they thud to the floor, her knees on either side of my thighs. She's warm from the shower and smells like my shampoo.

"I fucking love you in this shirt."

"I ran out of clean ones," she explains. "I don't know why I didn't bring more things over."

"Probably distracted by the Original hybrid hell-bent on killing you who's temporarily trapped in your living room."

She smiles. "That sounds ridiculous when you say it out loud like that. And speaking of things said out loud, you'd better not mean what you said about my baby brother."

"Technically, he's your cousin," I remind her. "So I don't think it's even illegal, what I suggested."

She playfully swats me. "Damon."

"_Elena._"

She smiles at me, that megawatt smile I love so much, and before I can help myself, I've reached up and captured her bottom lip between my teeth. I bite, just hard enough to draw a drop of blood, which I lick away with my tongue. She whimpers and squirms on my lap, rubbing all the right places. My hands reach under her shirt and up her back, and I've only just discovered she's not wearing anything underneath when she pulls away.

"Wait," she breathlessly says. "Stop."

"I can't," I whisper, biting her nipples through her shirt with blunt teeth. She's whole and not dead-dead and sitting on my lap, and to hell with the fucking sire-bond because now, right now, I am a weak, selfish fuck and just need her safe and warm in my arms. "I know I said I had to be a gentleman until we figure out this sire thing, but I can't. Fuck, Elena, I can't. I have to have you."

"Not here," she whispers.

"What?"

"I don't want you to stop, but we can't. Not here." She nods her head towards the stairs.

"Fuck him."

"No, Damon. There's enough hurt and blame to go around. We're not going to make it worse."

I close my eyes and bang my head on the back of the sofa. "You have got to be fucking kidding me. Really? You're worried about St. Stefan's precious feelings? He just fucking drained me and threw me on the fucking floor of the dungeon before hopping into Rebekah's fucking bed."

Elena worries her bottom lip with her teeth and nods. "I know," she whispers. "You don't need to remind me."

"I shouldn't have said that," I say.

"No, it's fine. Really. I mean, I wish..."

"No," I interrupt. "New plan: no serious talk tonight. Let's save that for tomorrow. Let's just take five minutes tonight. A time-out. Just for us."

"Only five minutes?" she teases.

"Well, it can be five minutes over and over and over." I have to stop talking so I can taste her again, licking her lips and sucking her tongue into my mouth.

"Stop," she insists again. I groan and slam my head back into the sofa. "Don't be mad," she pleads. "It's just... I never realized. Before." If she could still blush, I have no doubt her cheeks would be flaming. "I mean, he told me you could hear, but I didn't really believe him or think much about it. But all those times. My gosh!" She shakes her head. "I _never_ would have, if I'd known you could hear us."

I shrug. "Does it make you feel better to know I usually jerked off while I listened to you come?"

She rolls her eyes. "You really are disgusting. But." She smiles at me again, looking at me through her lashes. "Did you really?"

I hold up my right hand. "Swear to god. You in the house, the smell of your arousal, your little moans, and these fingers." I wiggle them for her. "Perfect storm." She leans forward and captures my middle finger in her mouth, sucking and licking and nibbling it. "And now that I know you weren't intentionally trying to keep quiet? That ol' Stef never made you make more noise than that? I'm so going to fuck you till you scream."

She kisses me until my hips begin moving of their volition. Then, without warning, she hops off my lap and entwines her fingers with mine, pulling on my arm.

"Come on."

"I'm trying!" I protest. "I'm trying to come." I bury my face in her belly, my fingers digging into her hips.

"Damon," she says again, tugging on my hair. "I need you to get up before I lose my self control. I don't want any regrets."

Fuck. She wins. She always wins.

"Where are we going?" I ask as I allow her to pull me to my feet. "'Cause I'm pretty sure your room is out."

"I can think of a really good time-out place," she says, and I know immediately what she has in mind.

"I like how you think," I say.

I can't rein in what I know is a goofy grin splitting my cheeks. I can't remember the last time I felt this good. Can this girl be any more fucking adorable? I grab a bottle from the bar and a couple of blood bags from the kitchen fridge and let her lead me out into the garage. I open the passenger door of the Camaro, loving the way she drops into her.

Elena couldn't possibly know, and I'm certainly not going to tell her, not tonight, but I've never been with anyone in my car. I don't even like to give people rides, and when it's unavoidable, I drive around with the top down after, airing her out. But Elena is different. I want to make her come over and over inside my car. I want her to hump the driver's seat while her fingers are buried in her sodden pussy. I want to eat her out and wipe her sweetness against the leather until it's saturated with her scent.

"My girls," I purr when I get behind the wheel and turn the ignition, the engine rumbling to life.

"Did you just compare me to your car?" she asks with a scowl.

I nod. "Indeed I did."

"You certainly know how to make a girl swoon," she says, her voice dripping with sarcasm.

"Fuck yeah," I agree, pulling out my iPod. The sound system has been upgraded, but everything else is exactly the way it was when I bought her in 1969. The one constant in my life these past decades. I've loved cars before, but none like this one. "And I have just the song."

"_Sugar, ah honey honey. You are my candy girl. And you've got me wanting you._"

Elena laughs and shakes her head. "I'm your candy girl? Are you serious?"

I set the song to repeat and turn it up, making sure the noise will drown out any sounds we might make. Before she can react, I pull us both into the back seat. I lean back and once again situate her so she's straddling my lap.

"And here I thought you were going to seduce me with your extensive knowledge of music."

"Oh, I will," I promise. And I want to. "But not tonight. Now, where were we when your conscience so rudely interrupted?"

"Let me think," she says, wiggling her hips against my raging hard on.

"I just can't believe the loveliness of loving you," I sing along, tucking her hair behind her ear. "When I kissed you, girl, I knew how sweet a kiss could be. Like the summer sunshine, pour your sweetness over me."

"You sing," she says with a smile. I nod. "You sing really well. Although I'm still questioning your song selection."

"What?" I protest. "Not only is it true, but I dare you to feel anything but cheerful when you hear this song." I move my hips in time to the music. "If you want music to slit your wrists to, there's a little red Porsche you can brood in." I nod my head towards Stefan's car. "Knock yourself out." She laughs."Where's a 60s Decade Dance when we need one?"

"I think we should probably avoid all school dances from now on, for our own safety."

I shake my head. "Nope. Not tonight. We'll be serious tomorrow. We'll be practical, and we'll have a discussion that will probably end with both of us yelling and possibly breaking things about how you're not going to risk your life unnecessarily ever ever again." She opens her mouth to retort, but I press my finger over her lips. "We're taking five minutes, remember? There's no danger. No worries. No regrets. We don't have a care in the world so long as this song is playing and you're pouring your sweetness over me."

"You want my sweetness?"

"Oh yes," I moan, crushing her to me.

She noses her way into my neck, my throat, kissing and licking and gasping as her fingers creep up under my shirt to find my nipples, tugging them, pressing her lips to them through my shirt.

"Off," she orders, and I'm about to tear my shirt when her hands stop me. "We've ruined enough clothes today." I couldn't care less about how many shirts I've destroyed, but I let her help me pull it over my head. I love the way her breath catches in her throat when she puts both hands onto my chest, running them up and down my skin. "You're so beautiful," she whispers. "So beautiful."

Before I can stop her, she's licking me, blunt teeth nibbling their way down to my jeans. I groan when she pulls out my cock, hard and weeping. She rests her head against my chest and watches while she strokes it with both hands.

"I've missed you," she whispers into my belly. "I've missed you so much!"

"Elena," I moan. I pull her up so I can see her and kiss her tenderly on her lips. I suck one, and then the other into my mouth, my tongue gently probing, asking permission for access to her mouth.

"You have no idea," I finally say between kisses. It's only been a couple of days since I sent her away from me, but decades have passed more quickly.

I let my tongue explore her softness, and when I pull back, so I can see her, she whimpers in protest and crashes back into me. I don't complain because even though we're smashed into the backseat of my car, I can never be close enough to her. I want her. All of her. Every inch of me wants to touch her, to feel her, to make certain she's really here and safe and mine.

I unbutton each infuriating button, wanting desperately to rip my shirt from her body, but I follow her rules. My fingers tug her nipples as they pebble beneath my hands. She's moaning and rubbing herself against me, her jeans rough against my bare cock.

"Pants," I demand, and she nods. We both scramble to finish undressing. It's awkward in the car, all knees and elbows and feet. She's bare beneath her jeans too, and she's naked in seconds. But my pants get caught on my boots, and as I struggle, she squirms against me impatiently.

"Very smooth," she giggles.

"So mean," I reply.

She pouts, and I suck her bottom lip into my mouth before she pulls away and twists so she can help. Her ass is right in my face as she tugs on my boots, and I can't stop myself from leaning forward and burying my tongue into her wetness. She's dripping, oh honey honey, and I lick and suck and nibble, my fingers playing her clit in time to the music.

My boots finally off, she struggles to pull my jeans down, the stiff fabric caught at my legs' awkward angle.

"Fuck it," she growls, ripping them away.

"I thought we weren't ruining clothes," I murmur against her folds, loving the way she moans at the vibration and thrusts her hips to meet my mouth.

"Damon," she gasps, turning to straddle me once more.

She's gloriously vamped out, her eyes ferocious red, and I lick her fangs, testing their sharpness and drawing my own blood. She sucks savagely on my tongue and strokes me with one hand, placing me right where I need to be.

In one thrust, I'm buried to the hilt in her sweetness. We both cry out at the suddenness of our closeness after the eternity of being apart. And while I'm still gasping, she starts to move on top of me, riding me in the backseat of my car. She licks a stray drop of my blood from her lips and wraps her arms around my neck.

"Drink," I manage to get out. "Please. Elena. Bite me."

She doesn't hesitate, just sinks those beautiful fangs into my jugular. Probably it's luck, but she hits the sweet spot, so she doesn't have to suck, my blood gushing into her waiting mouth without effort. Knowing that I'm filling her, in every way she can be filled, is enough to bring out my own fangs. I feel the heat around my eyes and the sharpness in my mouth.

When she's had her fill, when her tongue laves the now-closed wound on my neck, I rear back and bite her in that sensitive spot behind her ear. I immediately feel her clench around me, my drinking bringing on her orgasm, and I suck at her tender flesh as she cries out and clutches my hair and presses herself against me. The taste of her blood mixes deliciously with her wetness on my tongue, and I feel the urgency of my own release. My cock spilling and twitching inside her causes her to come again, and then she collapses bonelessly on top of me.

We're both gasping and panting, limbs at strange and uncomfortable angles, and my entire body tingles with her blood. I bury my fingers in her still-damp hair and kiss her eyelashes and trace the delicate swirl of her ear with my tongue.

"Are you alright?" I whisper.

"Mmmm," she murmurs, rubbing her face against my neck like a cat.

"Elena, did I take too much?" She's so young, and probably still healing from Kol staking her, and I shouldn't have bitten her like that.

She doesn't answer, just shakes her head against me.

"Elena, will you drink one of those juice boxes for me?"

"Damon," she says, her voice rumbling against my neck. "If I'm thirsty..." She runs her tongue along the vein in my neck.

I can't help but laugh and hold her tighter to me.

"Good Christ, I love you."

She leans back just enough to look into my eyes. Hers are brown once more, contented and a little droopy, like maybe she'll fall asleep in the backseat of my car before I carry her to my bed like a caveman.

"I love you, too."

"_Pour a little sugar on it, baby. I'm gonna make your life so sweet. Yeah yeah yeah. Pour a little sugar on it, yeah. Pour a little sugar on it, honey_."


	14. Dancing with the Devil

_A/N: Have to confess, "Into the Wild" left me mostly underwhelmed. I may have something percolate this week, but in the meantime, gentle readers, I hope you'll indulge me digging into TVD archives for this chapter. Thanks to afanoftvd for suggesting it back in December! This is my interpretation of a scene referenced in a conversation between Ric and Damon at the end of S3. It takes place during the couple months after S2 ended and before S3 began. My utmost gratitude, always, for CreepingMuse and her mad-beta skills. I hope you enjoy._

* * *

**Dancing with the Devil**

"All right, kids," Damon says after dealing the last card. "Ante up."

"Damn," Jeremy mutters under his breath. "I fold."

"Pussy," Damon retorts.

"Cheater," he shoots back.

"I don't cheat," Damon says, looking offended.

"Of course you do," I point out. "But maybe not at cards?"

"And you always seem to win," Elena adds. She reaches for the notebook and Sharpie and raises an eyebrow as she leans over the paper, blocking it from view while she writes. "It's definitely shady."

"What? It's cheating to find a game that allows me to capitalize on my assets?" He looks to me. "Ric, I'm being ambushed by sore-losing amateurs."

I smile and shake my head. "You're on your own, buddy. I fold too."

"Ric!"

"Nope. Not talking me into it. I'm already dusting your parlor, changing these two's sheets..."

"Including washing comforters," Jeremy adds, popping another chip into his mouth and chewing loudly while Damon grimaces next to him.

"You eat like an animal," he mutters.

"Yes, thank you, Jeremy," I say, ignoring Damon's commentary. "And I'm picking up the next liquor store tab. This has gotten too rich for my blood."

Damon makes a big show of licking one of his fangs, only the briefest hint of dark veins flashing around his eyes. I've seen plenty of vampires in the past year, and he's the only one who's able to do that, bring them out on demand without losing control or turning his eyes red. It's a trick I don't completely understand.

"Now we're talking," he purrs at me. "Next time, I want Blood Donor written down and on the table from all of you." He stares intently at Jeremy, as if examining him. "Except you. I'll never be that thirsty."

"You're disgusting," Elena says, failing miserably to sound stern. She has the worst poker face ever and must be holding one helluva hand.

"Me?" Damon asks. "Your brother eats like that, and_ I'm_ the disgusting one?"

"I think the word you're looking for is incorrigible," I tell Elena.

"Shamelessly so," Damon agrees with a smile.

"Why don't we use money, like normal people?" Jeremy sulks through another mouthful of chip and guacamole, smacking pointedly in Damon's direction.

"Because I have more money than god," Damon replies. "So that would be 'cheating.'" He uses air-quotes, the cocky bastard. "Barter is a much more honest way of leveling the playing field."

"Even though you're a vampire who does everything really fast," Jeremy mutters. "Like that's fair."

"And it's not like we're normal," I ruefully add.

"Normal has been misused to the point of meaninglessness," Damon says. "It's supposed to establish a standard, not magically define whatever it is we all think we want to have. The cast of _Leave It To Beaver _was never 'normal,' thank Christ, 'cause tedium fucking sucks."

"Language," Elena scolds. Damon grins and winks at her.

Even by blended family standards, I think we're perched precariously out on a limb by ourselves. On the surface, maybe we look good. Jeremy didn't work tonight, so we're sitting around the table, Elena and Jeremy with sweaty glasses of sweet tea, me and Damon with bourbon, teasing each other and playing poker for household chores. Damon fixed dinner, and the warm, spicy scent from his carnitas lingers in the kitchen even though Damon, neat-freak that he is, insisted on putting away the food and washing the dishes before we sat down to play.

But add to that fact I'm not old enough to be their father and Damon looks young but is so old he could be their many-greats grandfather, and Elena's my dead-vampire wife's biological child she had when she was a child herself, and they're the niece and nephew of my dead girlfriend, who was turned into a vampire and then sacrificed by an Original werewolf-vampire hybrid to break a thousand-year old curse, and oh yeah – we're the typical American family.

I swallow the last of my drink as Damon grins at Elena. "I know you're in 'cause you can't be deceitful if you try. What's the bet? Bring it on, sweetheart."

"I'm deceitful!" She looks to both me and Jeremy. "I am."

I shake my head while Jeremy laughs, wiping the last of the guacamole from the bowl with a finger and sucking it clean.

"Love ya, 'Lena," Jeremy says, his finger still in his mouth. "But your poker face sucks. We all know you're rockin' an awesome hand." He turns to Damon. "Speaking of awesome, is there anymore of this?"

"Not at the moment," Damon says, staring intently at Elena. "It's better fresh." He pushes the bowl of salsa towards Jeremy before looking through his pieces of paper and pulling one from the stack. Waving it between two fingers, he holds it up for us all to see. "Kitchen duty for a week."

Elena scoffs. "No way. You do that anyway."

"'Cause your cooking fucking sucks."

She shakes her head. "You're so mean. I want something you wouldn't normally give me. Something good."

He stares at her, and Elena stares right back, unflinching. Damon finally nods, conceding defeat, and picks another offer from his stack of slips. "Wash, wax, and detail your car."

Elena nods her consent before she holds up her own paper, the one she just wrote. "Dinner and _Twilight_ movie marathon with the whole gang at your house, no insults or sarcasm allowed, followed by a lively discussion, which you will lead."

Jeremy and I both stare, open-mouthed, at the bet. She's holding something really great. If he's smart, he'll call it quits now. But I see the way his eyes sparkle when he looks at her. He wants to see how far she'll go, and he doesn't care whether or not he loses in the process. And that is why, as much as I like him, I don't want Elena getting too comfortable around Damon. It's one thing for me, a broken-down alcoholic with a tragic love life, to hang out with someone with nothing to lose. But not Elena. Not on my watch.

"Harsh," Jeremy says to Damon as he steadily eats his way through Damon's homemade salsa. "No way you're going to win this time."

Damon doesn't look away from Elena, stares her down while she tries not to smile back at him. He nods, reaches for the pad of paper, and scribbles his own new bet. His writing, compared to the rest of ours, is insanely elegant. His wager slips look engraved even though he writes so fast his fingers blur.

"I call: mani-pedi-hour massage, performed by yours truly, no flirting of any kind throughout."

"Scratch off the massage," I say. "No way."

"Ric," Elena says still not taking her eyes off Damon. "This is between me and him. Damon, scratch off the massage. You can replace it with a shopping spree."

"Your loss," he says, neatly putting perfectly straight, parallel lines through the massage. "Vampire strength? Stamina? You'd never want another masseur."

"Isn't it masseuse?" Jeremy asks.

"Do I look like a fucking chick to you?" Damon asks.

"Language," Elena says.

"Shopping spree is vague," Damon says, as if Jeremy hadn't interrupted. "What, specifically, do you want me to buy you? Or is it my choice?" He smolders at her, and I kick him under the table. The full force of my boot on his shin scoots his chair away from the table, but he doesn't even flinch.

"Jeans," she says without hesitation.

"Boring," he replies, but writes it anyway. He tosses the paper into the middle of the table. "What about me? What are you offering me?"

"I really don't have to offer anything, since I'm going to win."

"Confidence is high," Jeremy says with a grin. "I like it."

"Wow me anyway," Damon says with a smirk. "Come on, Elena. What are you going to give me?"

"Laundry for a week?" she says.

He scoffs. "Try again."

"Want me to clean your car?"

"I never let anyone touch my car," he says, shaking his head.

Elena bites her bottom lip, thinking. "Okay. How about the same? Mani-pedi and jeans?"

He smiles. "You can't afford my jeans."

"Elena, first rule of gambling, don't write checks you can't cash," I quietly warn.

"I'm going to win," she says. "So I won't have to buy them."

He once more stares her down, and again, he's the one to look away first. "Fine. Write it in. But don't think I won't make you cough up when you lose."

"Elena, you aren't tapping into your college fund to buy this asshole pants."

"I've got this, Ric," she replies.

"Yeah, no interfering from the grown up," Damon says with a smirk.

Elena tosses her slip of paper onto the pile. "Let's see what you got."

"Full house," Damon says. He lays down three tens and two Jacks.

I groan, but Elena beams. "Straight flush," she says, revealing her hand. "Queen high."

"Hearts," Damon quietly says with a wink and a smile. "My favorite."

"Dude, no wonder we both got shit hands," Jeremy say, thumping my shoulder.

"Language," Elena repeats.

"They got all the good cards!" He's smiling though, even as he sulks. "We're out of food."

"Because you ate it all," Damon says.

"And I have to open tomorrow," Jeremy says, ignoring him. "So I'm calling it a night."

"Be sure to brush your teeth before you lick your computer screen," Damon says in a innocent voice, nodding his head knowingly. "And give Bonnie's tongue my regards."

"Fuck you, Damon," Jeremy replies, taking the stairs two at a time. "Stop eavesdropping."

"Language!" Elena says again.

"Stop making out with your girlfriend on Skype!" Damon shouts.

"What?" Jeremy hollers from upstairs. "I can't hear you."

"Boys," Elena says to me, rolling her eyes. She gathers her pile of slips and smiles while she flips through her treasure trove of chores and promised gifts. She tucks them into the back pocket of her shorts and starts piling up the plates and glasses and empty dip bowls. "But they aren't really." She looks at him. "Are they?"

Damon waggles his eyebrows at her. "Wouldn't you like to know?"

"Tease," she pouts.

As much as I hate to admit it, no amount of frozen yogurt with Caroline or basketball with Matt makes these kids smile like family night with Damon. There's so much to be sad about, so much to feel guilty and brood and be angry over, and it's unexpected because Damon needles and pokes and prods. He's merciless, but he always knows exactly how much and what to dish out so he leaves both of them in good moods, even if they're annoyed with him. I don't know how I'd manage without him.

"Your turn to clean up the kitchen, Elena," Damon say, leaning back in his chair. "I would've had to do it, but you didn't want me to bet that."

"Oh I know," she sweetly replies. "But I'm just going to run some water over these and deal with them in the morning." She smiles at him. "Are you done with your glass?"

"Yes," he grumbles, passing it to her.

"Ric?"

"I'll get it later."

She's quietly laughing while she rinses and piles everything onto the counter. "Goodnight, Damon," she says. She stops by my chair, her hands still warm and damp from the sink when she rests them on my shoulders. "Goodnight, Ric." She kisses the top of my head before childishly sticking out her tongue at him and sauntering out of the kitchen towards the stairs.

She doesn't even make it to the creaking stair just below the landing before Damon's at the sink, running water so hot it sends wafts of steam into the air.

"She really will get them in the morning," I say.

"Yes, but then there are dirty dishes laying around all night. And she accuses me of being disgusting."

"Damon, she rinsed them. Just leave it be." I sigh, but it's not unhappy. Mediating theses little bickering matches is a privilege I wouldn't trade it for anything.

He taps his nose with a bubbly finger. "Shit stinks. It'll only take me a minute. Oh! Hey. It's your theme song."

I look around, not hearing any music, wondering what he's talking about. He nods his head towards Jeremy's iPod docked on the counter.

"No?" he asks. "Can't hear it?"

I shake my head, and he flashes to the little speakers and turns it up.

"All my friends were vampires," Damon sings along. "Didn't know they were vampires. Turns out I'm a vampire myself in the devil town."

I have to laugh when he starts dancing, moving his hips and tapping his left foot to the sultry beat of the song. I'm grateful Elena went up to bed because I'm not blind, and neither is she, and Damon can't help but be... well... Damon, dancing and singing while he cleans up the kitchen in spite of me being here to witness it.

I came here not sure I believed vampires even existed, and I stumbled into the very one I'd been looking for, intent on killing him because he'd taken Isobel from me. This town has given me everything I ever wanted when I fell in love with Isobel and asked her to marry me: a home and a family. Only they're not mine, none of it, and I'm sharing these stolen moments not with the woman I love, but a vampire I wanted to kill. Only now he's my best friend who's singing in the kitchen and helping me keep these kids safe. My only friend.

The song over, the last of the dishes washed and dripping on the rack, Damon turns off the water and punches the power button on the iHome.

"I didn't know you sang," I say, getting up to refill my drink.

"What is it with you fucking people?" Damon snaps the towel and dries his hands. "I kill someone? Rip out a goddamn heart and toss it on the floor, and everyone's all, 'That's just Damon.' I do something nice, like fix a fucking meal that doesn't suck or sing on pitch, and everyone's fucking shocked."

"Don't be a dick," I say. "You know I didn't mean it like that." I pour the last inch of the bourbon into my glass. The empty bottle clinks against two others in the trashcan. Damn. Did we drink that much today? "Are we out, or is there another bottle in the cupboard?"

He opens the door and pulls out a fresh bottle. "Last one, my friend. Liquor store run tomorrow, but for moment, you are saved from drinking Bloody Marys with me." He says it with a smile, nodding towards the fridge. "Although Elena was kind enough to suggest I stash some blood bags over here, so we do have the ingredients."

I shudder. "I had no idea you were actually going to pour the vodka into the glass of blood. Talk about disgusting."

Damon shrugs unapologetically. "Vampire."

I swallow the contents of my glass and set it in the sink, content to drink from the bottle now that Jeremy and Elena aren't around to watch. Damon rolls his eyes at me and washes my glass at vampire speed.

"I think I'll stick with bourbon," I say, cracking the seal on the new bottle and taking a swallow.

"That shit'll kill you."

"So will everything else," I say, flopping onto the couch. Damon wipes down the table before falling onto the other end. He lifts my feet and rests them on his lap before kicking his own legs onto the coffee table. "That was bold, letting her bet a _Twilight _movie-marathon."

He shrugs. "She overplayed her hand. Caroline won't agree to it."

"Sounds right up her alley," I say.

"She and I, well, when we were, what's the word?"

"When you were head-fucking her?" I suggest, not able to keep the disgust out of my voice.

"Oh, you didn't even know her then. Don't judge. But yes, while I head-fucked her, among other things, we shared a _Twilight_ moment. She'll never agree to the marathon, certainly not with me."

"You do cheat," I say.

He nods. "Fuck yeah I do." He's quiet for a moment, passing the bottle back and forth between us. "New jeans is non-specific. Do you think she'd go for a shopping trip in New York?"

"You aren't taking her to New York, asshole. She's not even eighteen."

"Almost, dick, and I was talking about taking all of us," he snaps back. "Why not take this family fun-fest on the road? I'm sure you can think of something boring and educational. We can get a suite at the Waldorf for a week. Maybe two. Do some shopping, eat at nice restaurants, see some shows, take in some art. Let's get the hell out of this godforsaken town."

"I don't know if I can be responsible for them in New York. I barely manage here."

Damon rolls his eyes at me. "Trust me: they'll be safer there then they are in Mystic fucking Falls. What a death trap." He takes a drink from the bottle and passes it back to me. "I fucking love New York."

I smile. "I can see that."

"Did I ever tell you about the time I compelled my way onto a Broadway performance of _Phantom of the Opera_?"

I laugh so hard I choke before handing over the bottle before I drop it. "You're kidding me."

He laughs too and shakes his head. "Swear to god. Just the one performance. But oh, it was fun."

"You were the Phantom?"

Damon snorts derisively. "I have some delusions of grandeur, but let's not lose our heads. No, I just wanted to do the Masquerade scene."

"Did you mess it up?"

"Fuck no!" he says, clearly insulted. "I watched every performance and practiced for a week. I found the guy I wanted to be, and I took over for him during the one song. And I was perfect, I might add. Fucking perfect."

I can picture it, Damon dancing onstage, singing a deceptively upbeat song about the sinister dangers of hiding behind masks, a reality he understands all too well. Of course he played his part perfectly.

"How's everything upstairs?" I ask.

Damon closes his eyes and leans his head on the back of the couch. "Jeremy's saying goodnight to Bonnie. He just called me a douche and." He pauses for a second. "Oh gross! She has a flair for description, that one."

"Don't need those kind of details, jackass."

"You asked. Elena just finished brushing her teeth. She's checking her phone for the ten thousandth time. And now she's climbing into bed." He pats me on the knee. "Not to worry, Papa Bear – the kids are alright."

"Does she really think he's going to call her?" I quietly ask. Damon shrugs. "Do you think he will?"

He's quiet for so long, unmoving and unbreathing beside me, that I think he won't answer. He takes a long swallow from the bottle of bourbon, and then a second before passing it to me. Finally, he whispers, "I don't have a fucking clue what Stefan thinks."

"You're sure the bodies you've found are his?" I ask again.

Damon nods. "Yep. And for the record, I am a good masseur."

"I never had any doubt," I honestly reply, allowing him to change the subject.

"She's carrying too much tension in her shoulders. I'd take good care of her."

"Damon," I begin.

"I'll give you a pedicure too," he interrupts. "Next family night? Pedicures for everyone. I bet your toes are nasty."

"They're supposed to be. I'm a guy. Aren't yours?"

He glares at me and snatches back the bottle. "Please. I'm a fastidious groomer."

I can't help but laugh and take the bottle back from him. "You're a metrosexual snob."

I take another long, slow swallow from the bottle. The silence between us is calming and comfortable, and I've never felt more at home than on a sofa that doesn't belong to me with my feet in a vampire's lap.

I swallow again, needing but not wanting to talk about the damn couch, why I won't go back to my loft, but why I won't move into the empty bedroom either. Jenna's room. Why I'm trapped in self-exile on a too-short sofa that doesn't even belong to me.

"I don't get how you can tell they're Stefan's," I finally say, moving the subject to Damon's shit and away from mine. "How do neck wounds from one vampire look different from neck wounds from another vampire? Are his teeth that distinctive?"

Damon sighs and reaches back for the bottle. "Stefan leaves a kind of calling card. Trust me: they're his kills. You don't want the gory details tonight, and I sure as shit don't want to tell you. Not until I have to."

"But what does that mean?" I ask. "That he's killing people, but he hasn't told Klaus Elena's alive? I thought he wasn't himself when he's drinking human blood?"

"He _is_ himself," Damon snaps. "Christ. This version of himself that he's shown you this past year? Stefan the saintly, brooding, guilty, sanctimonious control freak? That's the lie. Fuck."

"I don't understand," I say.

"It's simple, goddammit. It's all about control, and Stefan has none. He's all or nothing. Always has been. Even when we were kids."

"But how..."

"Let's get drunk and not talk," Damon interrupts. He grabs the bottle back from me and swallows steadily. He puts his head back on the sofa and closes his eyes. "Listen to that."

"Human," I remind him, retrieving the bottle before he drinks it all. He can switch to his vampiric Bloody Marys if we run out. I'm shit out of luck until tomorrow. "I don't hear anything."

"Elena and Jeremy, safe in their warm beds, dreaming of sugarplums." He sighs with contentment. "I love that sound, their steady breathing, their heartbeats. Jeremy snores a little bit, not a lot now, but he'll be intolerable when he's older. But Elena." He doesn't finish his thought, but a ghost of a smile raises the edges of his mouth.

"She doesn't snore?"

He shakes his head. "No."

I'm tempted to ask him if Andie snores, but I'm too relaxed right now. I try to muster the energy to sound like an overprotective father-type and defend Elena's virtue, which I desperately need to do.

"As much as I love your lectures, save it for another day," he says as if he can read my mind. "No need to worry, Ric. She's still my brother's girl, and I have no intention of cheating. If I win, it will be fair and square, so she's safe from the big, bad bump in the night that is me."

"You're not as bad as you want people to think," I quietly say.

"Says the man I've killed," Damon snaps. "So how's about you shut the fuck up."

I'm quiet, watching as he swallows from the bottle, cradles it in his hands like it's precious. He hands it back to me without looking and once again closes his eyes.

"You're right to keep her from me, Ric. I've killed so many people." He sighs. "I was a killer long before I met Katherine Pierce."

"That was war," I reply. "It's different."

He shrugs. "No difference. It's death. Me bringing strangers ugly, terrible death. And since then, some people I've killed just for the fun of it. Or boredom. Some really fucking miserable reasons. But really, does the whys of it matter? Since they all end up in the ground? And I'm not sorry. Not for a single one."

"Are you drunk?" I ask.

He smiles. "Maybe. We did start drinking before noon today. You?"

I nod even though his eyes are still closed, knowing he'll be able to sense the movement. "I'm the worst guardian ever."

"Nah," Damon disagrees. "You're doing just fine. Besides, I'm supposedly Stefan's guardian. I mean, that's the current story. Since those two haven't killed anyone this summer, I think that distinction is mine."

We both laugh a little, even though it's not funny, and I swallow again from the bottle, realizing it's nearly empty.

"I don't believe you," I quietly say. "You've been sorry, just since I've known you. For me. For Jeremy. For Rose."

"Fucking Rose," he says, but despite the harsh words, there's no anger or malice in his tone, just sadness and maybe even regret.

"You had to," I say. "She was dying, and she could've hurt a lot of people. I've no doubt you did what had to be done with kindness."

"I staked her in my bed, asshole," he says. "Nothing kind about that. And I did it after I invaded her mind and gave her a dream to die to, a beautiful dream of sunshine and rainbows and rolling hills. All I gave her was a big fucking lie followed by ugly fucking death."

"Damon," I begin.

"Just shut the fuck up already," he snaps. "Jesus."

I swallow the last of the bourbon and let the empty bottle fall to the floor. Damon gently moves my feet, picks it up, and flashes around the house. He takes out the kitchen trash and checks the locks and turns off all the lights. He covers me with the quilt and sits back down, once again moving my feet to his lap. He eases off my boots and lets them drop softly to the floor. I close my eyes, enjoying the darkness that settles over me, warm and friendly.

"You know I'm going to use that against you one day," I finally whisper.

He squeezes my ankle and I can hear the smile in his voice. "'Cause you're a dick like that?"

"Damn straight."

* * *

_A/N: The song, if y'all aren't familiar with it, is Devil Town, performed by Tony Lucca._


	15. Me and My Shadow

_A/N: Long story short: everyone keeps raving about how awesome "Down the Rabbit Hole" is, and I haven't seen it yet. In the meantime, please let me offer an extended Kat POV from 2.22, "As I Lay Dying." More gratitude than usual for CreepingMuse, seriously awesome beta, who was kind enough to deal with revisions. _

* * *

**Me and My Shadow**

Finally sprung, I race through town, too fast for anyone to see. I move as though the air is pushing me along, helping me gain impossible speed. I run through the woods towards the boarding house on my toes because I learned the hard way that the force of flashing at such velocity will snap a heel, and I don't have time for that. Plus, I really like these shoes. But the fresh night air, richly layered and alive and tingling all my senses, overwhelms me with sights and smells and sounds. I can even taste the dirt as I breathe deep breaths my lungs really don't need anymore but oh, this is my heaven. There's nothing I love more than the wind in my hair and the world at my feet, full of nothing but unclaimed and expectant potential.

I control my fate. Me. No one else. And I've survived because I don't let myself get cornered, not by anyone or anything.

It feels so good to be free I can't help but let out a laugh.

I hate being trapped more than anything, and believe me, there's plenty to hate when you've had five hundred years to experience the world and all the ways it will fuck you over. Even if I hadn't spent my life running from Klaus, I wouldn't have wanted to settle down and play human. Hell, I turned myself into a vampire to escape my mundane human existence, so I didn't live my life trapped in a frail female body only to wither and die after being consumed by a husband and brood of sniveling children.

And Mystic Falls, again, has proven itself to be one big ensnarement. I always hated this town. It was never supposed to be more than a stopping point, the site of my epic, fiery death, the tales of which would circulate the known world and eventually get to Klaus. That was my plan, and it was a good plan, only I had to go and fuck everything up because I allowed myself to stupidly luxuriate in Stefan and Damon's beds.

I enjoy luxuries as much as the next girl, but luxuries make you weak. They lure you into feeling safe. Comfortable. And then you get sloppy. There is survival, and there is death, and everything else, no matter how good it feels in the moment, is nothing more than a distraction.

And love? Love is biggest fucking death trap of all.

Take Stefan. Jesus. He came willingly to the apartment, the latest cage I found myself locked in in Mystic Falls. He said they'd run into complications during the sacrifice, and that's why Klaus wasn't dead and I was still trapped in that dump.

Like I didn't know what 'complications' meant?

Elena fucking Gilbert. I hate that saccharine, credulous bitch, with her straight, boring hair and Converse tennis shoes and vapid smile. The way they rally around her, fawning and swooning and falling over themselves and each other for the privilege of sniffing her precious panties. Everyone wants to protect poor, sweet, innocent Elena.

Spare me the drama of all the sadly metaphorical bleeding hearts. They used to love me. And now they all despise me, including her, but give her long enough and the right situation, and she'll be exactly like me. You know how I know that? Because as much as we'd both like to deny it, she _is_ me. An exact copy magically recreated.

We are a fucking ingredient.

And Stefan walked straight into the lion's den because he's a love-sick moron. It's no small miracle he's not already long dead.

"So, what's troubling Damon?" Klaus congenially asked , stepping around Elijah, daggered and unmoving on the floor.

"Tyler bit him," Stefan quietly answered, glancing quickly at me.

My face was frozen in its well-practiced, bored expression, betraying nothing except the fact I know I look quite pretty when I sulk. I refuse to apologize for using any and all weapons in my arsenal, and handing ammunition over to the enemy is suicide.

"Ouch," Klaus said, flashing those damn dimples, his own prettiest expression. But I know he's never more dangerous than when he's smiling. "Werewolves are so unpredictable."

"He's dying."

"Terrible way to go," Klaus agreed. "It's a bloody shame. I like your brother." At that he burst into laughter. "Who am I kidding? We know I don't fancy him." He smiled. "But you, Stefan," he said, his voice once again soft and gentle.

He crooned like a lover and ran his fingers through Stefan's hair the way I used to, artfully mussing it. I thought for a second that maybe Klaus was going to kiss him. Wouldn't that have been quite the show.

Instead, without warning, Klaus pushed him against the wall, and the stake moved so fast Stefan would have been dead before I could scream. Only luckily I didn't scream, and he's not dead but only because Klaus didn't want him to be.

Damon dying. Stefan dying. All of us ambushed and at Klaus' mercy.

My mouth filled with my own blood as I bit my cheeks.

And then he called for me, that amiable voice I've learned well to fear. And before I could react, before I could so much as defend myself, he savagely bit my arm, his fangs sunk down to the bones.

"No," I said. I heard my voice from far away, as if someone else was speaking. I hated the rising hysteria, the weakness and terror it revealed, but I was helpless to stop it. "No. No. No. No."

I felt the way this wound was different, the way it burned, tongues of flame licking up my arm and down into my hand, the poison quickly spreading.

My only thought was that it couldn't end like that. I'd come too far to be lost in a painful sea of visions, haunted by all my mistakes and regrets. Trapped inside my own mutinous mind until my body finally gave up and I died choking on my own blood.

No.

But Klaus didn't intend for me to die. He merely used me as his Exhibit A, proof that he indeed had the cure.

Fucking men and their self-centered presumptions. I've enjoyed, over the centuries, luring them in with big doe-eyes wet with tears: "Please, sir. Help me." Most of them turn from hero to villain in a heartbeat. And if I were indeed as helpless as they assumed, I would've been dead hundreds, probably thousands, of times over, and they wouldn't have shed a tear or lost a wink of sleep. I find great satisfaction knowing they die wondering how the hell a little girl overpowered them.

Klaus may be an Original, but he's no different, and when he finally dies, I want his eyes to close forever on the vision of me laughing at his demise, at me using his own weaknesses against him. I want that miserable bastard to die knowing I will survive long after he's nothing but dust.

"There it is," Klaus said, the silver of the knife flashing before he held his dripping wound over a small bottle, filling it with his blood. "You want to save your brother? How about a decade long bender?"

Stefan can't live in a world without Damon in it. I knew that in 1864. Sure, I wanted them both for myself. Who wouldn't? But beyond me being used to getting what I want, I realized the Salvatore brothers came as a set. And Klaus knows it too.

So I watched as Stefan transformed into the Ripper. He sucked blood bags dry, closing his eyes, the relief and horror and pleasure and hatred flashing across his face. Growls rumbled from his chest, a terrible, feral sound. The veins flickered around eyes that should be green but stayed red. He ended up crouched on the floor like an animal, tearing into the plastic with relish, licking the blood from his fingers, from the wooden floor.

"Katerina," Klaus said, lovingly rolling all the syllables of the name I killed and discarded to get away from him. Klaus stroked my wrist with a lazy thumb, pressing just hard enough to prove I couldn't get away. "Tell me, what do you think of your little protégé?"

"Messy eater, isn't he?" I replied in a bored voice. "I missed this the first time around. Not really the maternal type."

"Oh, Katerina, but you are maternal. That's why I'm here."

"And aren't we all grateful I'm a slut?" I snatched my hand away from him.

He smirked, still focused on Stefan. "Your word, luv, not mine. But I am grateful. Not just for the Petrova bloodline, but for Stefan, too." Klaus tossed him a fresh blood bag, and we watched as he snarled and tore into it. "You can't begin to realize the gift you've given me."

"If you'd been smart," I said, changing the subject away from Stefan's savagery "You would've had a minion knock up Elena. Risky, sacrificing the last drop of the bloodline without a backup. What's another nine months after a thousand years?"

Klaus shrugged, not looking away from Stefan. "I'm impatient."

"And I'm indifferent."

He smiled. "We both know that's a lie, Katerina." He said my name like a caress.

He's disgusting.

And not that I'd be stupid enough to admit it to Klaus, but no, I didn't know what Stefan would become when I fed him my blood. But when the whispers spread about a Salvatore Ripper, I knew it had to be Stefan. Unlike my sweet Damon, who needed no compulsion and never made excuses, Stefan proved, early on, to be a very different creature than his brother. Damon talked big and had an even bigger swagger, but he was all tender underbelly. All unapologetic heart. Damon was a lover, not a fighter, no matter how well he'd fared in battle. But Stefan? Underneath that sensitive, well-bred exterior lurked a cold, calculating resolve. And he needed to rationalize his desires and the things he did in his ruthless conquest of me. Justify them. Write down not what happened, but how he wanted to remember it.

Stefan went from blushing virgin to demanding lover overnight and would've bruised a human girl with his caresses. He was all or nothing, and because he'd only known love and gentleness in his human life, he assumed everything he did would be heralded by blessings.

"Look who's come up for air," Klaus said, nodding towards Stefan. "You're very cooperative, mate. It's almost as if you're enjoying it."

Stefan shook his head and gripped his knees so hard he must've drawn his own blood. He fought an epic battle with himself, his own worst enemy, forcing back the blood lust. He gasped and grunted and shook from the effort. His eyes, finally, were green. And as he looked at me, they weren't the boyish green eyes that peered from his face when he vowed he would love me forever when he didn't understand how long that could be.

He looked old and weary but resolved.

Stefan would do this, trap himself once more within the confines of his personal hell. And he'd do it willingly, without regret. He'd throw away everything he'd fought for, this second chance, this redemption with a human girl who looks just like me. And he'd throw it all away for love.

Only not for me this time, or for her.

"No more," Stefan finally said. "Not until you give me the cure."

Klaus handed his bottle of blood to me, looking deeply into my eyes, compelling me. "Sweetheart, take this over to Damon and come right back."

"You want me to leave?" I asked, burying my glee, forcing my voice to be expressionless and dull.

"No!" Stefan pleads.

"Yes," Klaus said, ignoring Stefan. I smiled at Stefan, just a flash, to assure him that I wouldn't let his sacrifice be in vain. "And if I were you..."

I flashed off before Klaus could finish, knowing Stefan didn't think I'd live up to my end of the bargain. He knows I'm on vervain. He doesn't trust me.

And I can't blame him for that.

But I can't let Damon die. As it turns out, I can't imagine living in a world without him in it either.

Whatever. Klaus still needs to be killed, and these two idiots won't stop until their precious Elena is safe. They're going to need my help, and then they'll owe me.

I like people owing me.

I flashed over to the house because I'm faster than a car and it felt so good to run after all those days inside.

The front door is unlocked, as always, and I rush on silent feet upstairs to Damon's room. His door is open, and it's easy to listen to them from the hall.

Damon sounds awful, his voice weak. "I do, Elena," he says.

He says her name the way he used to say mine. Not like he says it now, full of mockery and disgust. Every time he says my name, I hear how much he hates himself.

He says _Elena_ like a man at prayer.

"It's okay 'cause if I had chosen differently, I wouldn't have met you. I'm so sorry. Done so many things to hurt you."

"It's okay. I forgive you," I hear my voice reply, speaking words I haven't said in so long I don't know how to say them anymore.

"I know you love Stefan, and it will always be Stefan," he whispers.

I hate that I said those words to him that night. Because they're both true and not true, as they always were and always will be.

"But I love you," he tells her. "You should know that."

Elena's crying, another sound I barely recognize. I'm not Elena, and crying is a luxury I can't afford.

"I do," she assures him, snuffling.

"You should have met me in 1864. You would have liked me."

"I like you now. Just the way you are," she sweetly answers. She does that. Always knows the right thing to say.

She disgusts me. I hate her because I am her. Or I was.

Too long ago, I was a girl, younger than Elena is now, and I thought I was special not because of magic blood, but because everyone loved me. I naively assumed everyone always would. Only my version of Elena's blue-eyed hottie, my childhood friend and lover, was married off to a rich widow because his father needed her money. But he promised to love me always, and I was stupid enough to believe him. Until the day I told him I was carrying his child, and he looked away from me and said in a hard, tight voice, "No. You aren't."

My family pretended I died. They buried who knows what in the ground while friends and neighbors mourned, and I was kept in hidden. Until my baby was ripped from my body and given away. I wasn't allowed to even see her. Hold her. And I was still bleeding when they banished me in disgrace. And when I was stupid enough to fall in love again, because I knew I had to find a husband before I was too old and ugly, it was to a vampire who wanted to sacrifice me.

So I killed that pathetic bitch who was looking for someone to defend her. To protect her and maybe, if she was very lucky, maybe he would love her. I spilled her magical blood so it was rendered useless. I rose from the ashes of Katerina Petrova's miserable existence as Katherine Pierce, strong enough to defend myself.

I will never be trapped again.

I lean against the door, a clear view of Damon's massive bed. He closes his eyes, and I watch as Elena kisses him softly on the lips.

"Thank you," he whispers, the same words he said the first time I kissed him so many years ago. The man with the icy blue eyes that had seen too much, but who courageously and stubbornly refused to admit it.

"Well," I interrupt, leaning against the door. "It's me you should be thanking. I mean, I'm the one who brought the cure." I wave the little bottle and look at the boring version of myself everyone loves. "I thought you were dead."

"I was," she says.

Too bad it didn't take.

I sit down on the bed next to Damon. "You got free," he says with a smile.

"Yep. Finally." I tip the contents of the bottle into his mouth, watching to make sure he swallows Klaus' blood.

"And you still came here?" he asks.

I'll admit his surprise feels like a stake in the gut. I want to slap him for being so willfully blind, for always following his heart, for wearing it so stupidly on his sleeve for anyone to see. But how can I explain that the things I hate the most about him, the weaknesses I loathe, are also the best parts of him? Even if I knew the right words to say, he wouldn't believe me. He'd just think I was playing him. Lying. Manipulating. Which isn't entirely untrue. So instead of speaking, I gently pat his beautiful face.

"I owed you one." It's quite possibly the understatement of the century, but I hope he understands.

He's too pitiful, too close, and I know he wants her and not me, so I stopper the bottle and get away from him.

Is that enough to cure him? I shake the bottle, seeing how much is left. Can I save this for a rainy day, or will it spoil? Does he need it all?

"Where's Stefan?" Elena finally asks.

"Are you sure you care?" I answer with a sultry smile, batting my eyelashes at her.

"Where is he?" she repeats, more angry this time. Yeah, not quite the damsel everyone makes her out to be. This one has fire. I would know.

"He's paying for this." I flourish the vial of blood. "He gave himself over to Klaus. I wouldn't expect him anytime soon."

"What do you mean?" Elena asks.

"He just sacrificed everything to save his brother, including you."

Bitch.

"It's a good thing you have Damon to keep you company. Good-bye, Elena."

I saunter towards the door. Go ahead, sweetheart, look at your own ass walking away. It's a nice view. And let what I just said sink in. I know it needs time because you're not used to it. But you've been rejected. Tossed aside.

How's that feel, precious, loveable Elena?

"Oh," I add. "And it's okay to love them both. I did."

I do.

Fuck, I really do. I love Stefan, and I love Damon, and it's weak and girly and pathetic. I hate it, but there it is.

I love them.

I toss the vial at Elena in case Damon needs to drink it all. Damn him. Damn this whole fucking town. I need to put miles between myself and this mess. I need to call in some debts and get some answers. And I need a fucking drink.


	16. Sitting Outside a Broken Wishing Well

_A/N: I've taken some liberties with the dialog from "Down the Rabbit Hole" for this expanded Damon POV. Thanks, always, to my incredibly talented beta, CreepingMuse, who brings out the best in my stories. I'd say she's magic, but I hate magic, so I won't use that word. I'll just call her awesome and leave it at that. _

* * *

**Sitting Outside a Broken Wishing Well **

"You gave up, didn't you?" Rebekah accuses, which is just plain shitty, seeing as how I have blood under my nails from prying wooden stakes out of her back. You're welcome, bitch.

Fuck, I was just trying to keep it simple and make sure the kid stayed alive: snap of the neck and stake to the heart. But between crazy Conner and his venom-spiked explosives and this Galen Vaughn and his nifty James Bond toys, the other hunters won't let Jeremy join in their reindeer games unless he stops killing like an amateur.

I groan, hating that I sound weak in front of Rebekah, and pull myself up so at least I'm not laying at her feet like a pussy.

"I didn't give up," I tell her.

Time has a way of working on wounds, either infecting them until they're a festering sore that constantly oozes because you can't stop poking at the fucking thing even though every time you do, it still hurts like a sonofabitch. Or, quietly, so quietly you don't even notice, it fades away until it's a distant memory, that defining hurt that was your only company until one day, just like that, you realize it's gone. It's been gone. And suddenly, for the first time in decades, you can breathe without wincing, and you are utterly alone.

I honestly don't know which one is worse.

"I just realized you can't control everything, no matter how hard you fucking try," I say. I don't owe this bitch the truth, and I don't know why I'm sharing my hard-earned revelations with her. But there it is. I've gotten so cuddly I may as well be a goddamn teddy bear. "Let's just say I made peace with that fact."

"Peace?" she scoffs. "You love Elena. You always will. If she becomes human, she may not feel the same way about you. You'll never know peace."

Christ. There it is. The tragic crux coming out of Rebekah's perfectly glossed lips. Who the fuck goes camping with cosmetics? I hate camping, and I hate these fucking people. I don't care if Klaus kills Tyler before slaughtering all of Mystic Falls, or Bonnie magically explodes, or Caroline spontaneously combusts in the sunrise because her ring didn't match that day's outfit, or Matt gets boringly shot during a robbery at the Grille.

I only care about Jeremy because Elena cares about Jeremy. I'm a selfish fuck. What's the use in pretending otherwise?

"Yeah, well, life fucking sucks," I snap. "Or did you miss that memo?"

"You did something selfless, Damon," she says with a smile and not nearly enough surprise in her voice.

More people have tried to kill me since I stopped being such a dick all the time than they ever did when I was kicking ass and not bothering to take names. What the fuck is up with that? And the people I made friends with? Cared about? They're dead, mostly. My brother and I are doomed to make each other miserable if we're lucky enough to be happy ourselves. And I try and win the girl fair and square and spend one incredible day thinking she actually loves me back? Yeah, that blows up in my face too.

The fucking irony. I would laugh, except I'm too goddamn tired right now. I just want to lay back down, maybe burrow into the dirt of this godforsaken cave in the middle of fucking nowhere and bury myself. Maybe I'll close my eyes and breathe without winching but pretend like the last two years never happened.

"Damon? That was meant as a compliment."

Fuck decency and the horse it rode in on. Fuck it all.

"Damon?" Rebekah repeats.

She pulls herself up so she's sitting next to me, and I feel her hand on my shoulder. She touches me carefully, not like she did that night after the ball, when we tore into each other like animals because neither of us could have the person we wanted. But at least revenge sex has its uses. I've learned the hard way that gentleness is always worse. Far more cruel because you don't see them coming, those soft touches that are so effective at shattering you into too many fucking pieces.

"Damon?"

"Jesus," I snap. "I'm choosing to ignore you. Christ. You and Stefan really are fucking perfect for each other."

Rebekah laughs. It echoes around the cave, a terrible, not funny sound. "What's with the pity-party?" she asks. "You're supposed to have a witty comeback so I can either laugh or want to kill you. That's what you do."

"Witty, shitty, it's open to interpretation. But yep," I agree. "That's what I do."

"This isn't funny."

"Nope," I agree again. "It's a goddamn tragedy."

Fuck it all to fucking hell. It's wrong to fucking feel this much. Too much all the goddamn time, and I can't turn it off again and get a moment of fucking peace. I'm sitting here with the blond version of Klaus beside a wishing well that's probably broken. If it's not, if by some fucking miracle it has what we're all here looking for, that's its own kind of nightmare too, and I care too much to just get up and walk away and never look back.

Of all the possible outcomes, no matter what happens down that goddamn well, this is going to end badly.

"Damon, what's wrong with you?"

"It's all wrong," I answer.

"You're scaring me."

"You're an Original, Rebekah," I say with a sigh. "Nothing should scare you." But the Rebekah I've come to know this past year is afraid of everything. Talk about fucking irony.

"Kol was afraid of Silas," she whispers. "Maybe we should be too."

"Fuck Silas. How could he possibly be worse than you and your fucked up family?"

"You're an asshole."

I nod. "Yep. I don't even know why I'm talking to you. Yet here I am, feeling nostalgic. Must be this place. Makes me think of the person I wish like hell I could see again. After 170 years, you'd think I'd have a longer list of dead people I care about, but it's just the one."

Ric? Are you here? If I bleed on this ground, will I be able to see you again? We need you, Ric.

I need you.

"If I didn't know better," Rebekah quietly says. "I'd say you were becoming a halfway decent person."

"Stefan said the same thing," I whisper. "Not too long ago. He said my humanity was showing."

Rebekah smiles. "I bet you punched him in the face."

I nod once. "Fuck yeah. And then I kicked the bastard while he was still writhing on the ground."

"Naturally." She rolls her eyes and gently bumps her shoulder into mine. "Boys."

I imagine her and all her brothers, still human, jostling and fighting and pummeling each other. Being kids. Rebekah in the thick of it, trying to hold her own. All of them pretending like they're playing fair, but secretly taking care to not hurt her because she's the girl but wanting to protect her feelings.

It's easy to forget, but like Elena, Rebekah is just a girl.

She stretches, moving her shoulders this way and that, taking deep breaths. She winces slightly at first, and then not at all.

"Healed?"

She nods. "Yeah. You?"

"Slowly. It was a long night. Happen to have any of those blood bags on you?"

She shakes her head. "There were a couple left, but I let Stefan have them since I snapped his neck."

"Halfway decent of you."

"Shut up," she says. There's nothing but the sound of the wind echoing through the cave. "Until recently," she finally continues. "Nik was the only one who daggered me. For as long as I've lived, and as many enemies as Nik has, I'm not much of a fighter. He has a lot of faults, but he took good care of me. As best as he knew how."

I guess I'm not the only one who can't stay pissed at my brother. But whatever. I don't give a shit about Rebekah or her motivations.

"There's just the one dose, you know," she continues. "Of the cure. Nik told me. That's why I took out Stefan."

"I got that good news from the chatty hunter today too. It's supposed to be used against this Silas guy." Neither of us move for several long, quiet seconds. "You'd better hurry."

"What are you talking about?"

"Why aren't you down there, jumping to the head of the line?"

Elena has the white oak stake, but she'll never use it, and we all know that. Although shit, she staked Kol with the damn thing, which I never saw coming. What the fuck do I know? But Rebekah is stronger and faster than the rest of us, with the added bonus of being damn-near indestructible. Not even Galen Vaughn's grenade thing that would've taken out any other vampire stopped her, just slowed her down.

Rebekah sighs and shifts next to me. "Yeah," she finally says, only she doesn't move to leap down into the hole. "You don't owe me explanations. It's not exactly like we're friends." She pauses, whether because she's waiting for me to contradict her or collecting her thoughts, I don't know. And I don't fucking care. "He'll give it to her, won't he?" she finally asks. "If he gets it?"

"He'd better," I say with a sigh. "After all this trouble, he goddamn good and well have the fucking sense to shove it down her throat, even if that means we have to carry her human ass out of this fucking cave."

But knowing Stefan, and I do, he won't. Always the hero, my baby brother, which means he can't ever bring himself to do the right fucking thing because doing the right thing means people hate you. And Elena, knowing there's only enough for one? Yeah, she's not going to willingly take it.

"She would do that?" Rebekah incredulously asks. "She would get this far and know everyone wants her to have it, and then refuse it?"

I nod.

"What about you? If there were enough for everyone, would you take it, Damon?"

I shake my head.

"Why?" she whispers. "Why wouldn't you want to have it all back?"

"Fucking head colds," I snap. "I sure as shit don't miss that, and that's just one reason on a very long list."

"I take back what I said about you being decent," she huffs.

I shrug. "I'm an asshole. Get over it or go away."

Why the fuck do they all think it's going to leave them exactly as they are now, only human? We don't know how the hell this cure works. All we know is that it was made by a fucking witch as a punishment for the asshole who didn't love her enough. Hell hath no fury and all. For all we know, it'll magically transport the vampire back to their last human moment, so they can die all over, only for real this time. Like I want my father to shoot me again, or Elena to drown again. Sure, that'd be fun. Or maybe it takes away the magic that makes us alive-ish rather than dead-ish, and so we wither away to a pile of bones in a matter of seconds. Or maybe it would take a really long time and be excruciating. When have witches ever told us the fucking truth? Treacherous, judgy little things.

There's an awkward silence, and Rebekah sniffs, like maybe she's going to cry. Christ.

"Even if it works like we want it to," I say so I don't have to deal with her fucking tears. "Best case scenario, and you are who you are right now except with a shorter expiration date? You're still going to be you. What makes you think being human is the answer you're looking for? Have you met an abundance of happy humans? 'Cause I sure as fuck haven't. You don't want to be human, Rebekah."

"Fuck you, Damon. You don't know me."

"I'm a fatalist," I say with a shrug. "But for what it's worth, your grass is never going to be any greener than it is now."

"Is it so wrong to want a human life with someone I love?" she quietly asks. "And children?"

"I suspect kids aren't quite the narcissistic rush you're expecting," I say. "Noisy, smelly, selfish little creatures. And you haven't found love in a thousand years. What makes you think you'll find it in sixty? You're fucking delusional."

"If I'm so wrong," she snaps. "Why are you still sitting here? Why aren't you helping her or on your way back home?"

Touche.

But there's a certain clarity that comes after a night spent with vertebrae painfully mending, followed by a long hike with a Hunter, trussed up with vervain-soaked rope. Some people crumble under physical duress. They'll tell you anything and everything, just to make the pain stop. Not me. It's fucked up, but my mind is never more clear than when I'm being tortured.

After my hours with Galen Vaughn and his painful inventions, I realize I don't have many regrets. There are the occasional exceptions, but this isn't one of them. I chose to be a vampire, and I chose to love Katherine. Neither worked out as I'd intended, but here I am. I wouldn't take it back. But Elena wants to make a different choice. Ric would want that for her too. And I just want the fucking truth. That's all I want. I want to know if she really wants me, of if she just thinks she does because my blood is telling her to.

Jesus. How did things get so fucked up?

But there's my moment of clarity: I love Elena Gilbert, quite possibly the most infuriating girl who ever lived. Annoyingly and recklessly and stupidly selfless. And ridiculously and adorably selfish, too, as only a little girl who's used to being loved can be. There are times I want to kill her myself because I love her so fucking much. I'll love Elena if she's human or a vampire or turns green and sprouts horns. I love Elena, even if that means she doesn't love me and never will.

I can live with unrequited love. It's the not knowing that will be the fucking death of me.


	17. Searing Pain of Purification - Part One

_A/N: I must begin by asking for forgiveness, gentle readers. After "Stand By Me," I felt an overabundance of, as CreepingMuse calls it, "feelings." I felt too many feelings. So many that I've coined a new phrase: OMF, as in Oh My Feelings. So I needed to write. Just me and the satisfying but lonely sound of my fingers clicking over the computer keys. While I do plan on staying in canon, the line between what actually happened and what only occurred in my head is becoming ever-more blurry, so I'm going to reference things that are important in my version of events but might not actually exist for this expanded Stefan POV. I know you won't enjoy 'cause it's not that kind of episode (and not that kind of chapter), but I hope it's what you need._

* * *

**Searing Pain of Purification - Part One**

She doesn't look back. Neither does Damon. The inescapable stench of the fire, the roar of the flames as they consume her home and all the memories contained inside. I know she can hear the cracks and the pops and the crashes as the fire eats its way through the downstairs, moving up towards her room. All her pictures and her clothes and her trophies. Her diary. Her bear. She didn't save anything of that life but the clothes on her back.

I pause on the path that I thought was my way to redemption and look at her porch one last time. Where, just a few minutes ago, I tried and failed to find the words I need and desperately want to say to my brother: I love you I've always loved you I don't know how I'd do any of this without you I need you more than anyone I'm sorry I'm so incredibly sorry why do you still love me I don't deserve you I don't deserve her love her enough for both of us keep her safe help her please don't ever leave me please don't hate me I don't hate you I don't hate you even when I think I do especially when I think I want to I'm an idiot forgive me brother. Only I didn't have to find them because Damon always hears me, even when my elusive words are lost somewhere between my heart and my mouth. He stood there with me, and he squeezed my shoulder because we're too stupid to ever actually hug each other, and we didn't say anything while I silently told him all the things that mattered and he silently said all the right things back.

It makes sense that such a momentous and simultaneously mundane event happened here. Because it's magic, this porch. Not magic like Bonnie wields, but its own special kind that somehow looks perfectly ordinary but makes miraculous and fleeting moments happen. Damon and I both waited for her here. Picked her up for doomed decade dances and dates. Stood guard over her sleep. We've kissed her here on this porch, both of us, and now both of us are useless to do anything but watch as it burns, destroying everything, including the girl who used to call this home. Only I'm the only one watching.

She's more like Damon than I've ever wanted to admit. He burned down our house too, the house where we were both born and grew up and died. He burned it so the flames concealed decaying bodies. My bodies. People I once knew and ripped into pieces as I fed. I would never destroy this shrine to the girl we both love, the alter where I prayed to become the person I've always wanted to be. But Elena did, and Damon didn't stop her. They both walked away without looking back. Without rescuing a single memento.

She opens the door and climbs gracefully into the backseat, flipping back the passenger seat so I don't have to. Probably just habit, to be polite, to thoughtfully consider other people, as ingrained as her hand reaching for a seat belt that isn't there and she doesn't need anymore. Because the girl sitting in the backseat isn't the Elena I know and love. She looks like her, maybe. There's something subtly different about her eyes. She looks more like Katherine than she ever has before.

This girl, this stranger, is a shell. A horrible, empty, not-hysterical shell. Everything I love about Elena is gone. Her fire, and isn't that ironic? But yes, her fire. Her passion. Even when she's arguing with me and using that fire against me, my God, I love her for it. And it's just gone. She gave up her metaphorical flames for the very real ones in the house.

Damon immediately puts down the top when he gets into the car, but not before I smell Elena and sex and blood. Her scent is stronger even than the smoke. It saturates his car. Damon doesn't say a word, just drives across town, away from the sound of sirens. Elena tilts her head this way and that, seeming to enjoy the wind playing in her hair. She hums and nods her head in time to music only she can hear. I can't make out the tune, but I watch as a single tear escapes and weaves its watery path down Damon's cheek.

Damon never cries, not that I know of. Not when we were alive, and not in all the years since.

We walk into the dark house, a bit of a chill in the air because no one's been home. She wanders into the parlor, standing before the cold hearth. It's clean, as it always is because Damon can't tolerate the lingering smell of the ashes. As always, after cleaning up, he laid out the wood and the kindling, ready and waiting for the strike of a match.

"There isn't a fire," she observes.

Damon and I exchange a quick look.

"Stop doing that," she says, not turning around. "I know you're making the 'Poor Elena' face, and I hate it. I've always hated it. I'm not poor, and if you want to say something, just say it already. No more secrets. No more lies. No more whispers behind my back."

"We've been gone," Damon says, walking slowly to her side, giving her time to tell him to go away if she wants. But she doesn't. "That's why there isn't a fire. Would you like me to start one?"

She nods and stands, unmoving and not breathing, while Damon quickly lights it.

"I need a drink," he says as if nothing is wrong. "Want one?"

She nods again but doesn't move, doesn't back away from the snapping flames that quickly overtake the dry logs.

"What about you, Stef?" he says over his shoulder at the bar, pouring bourbon into glasses. "You going to loiter in the doorway and let in all the bugs, or are you going to join us?"

"Sure," I say, finally closing the door and stepping into the room. "I could use a drink."

"Amen to that," Damon says, handing me a glass and clinking it gently against his own. "Elena." He holds out her glass in his palm, so she doesn't have to touch him to take it.

She empties what could only be described as a generous triple, neat, in a single swallow, still not looking away from the flames. She shudders and coughs and shakes her head.

"Another?" he quietly asks her. When she nods, he pours again, more than I would have given her, and she finishes the second the same way, only this time without flinching. "You hungry? How about some blood? Or I could fix you an egg? Or another drink?"

"No," she says, handing him her empty glass. "I'm going to take a shower. I smell." She sniffs the sleeve of her shirt. "Is that death? Is that what I smell like?"

"Elena," I say. "Don't."

"Don't what?" she says, still not turning or looking at either of us. "It's a legitimate question. This is what death smells like, isn't it?" She lowers her nose to her sleeve and breathes deeply. "Not like I expected. You'd think, after all the bodies I've buried, I'd know what death smells like. But I obviously don't. It's not at all like that funeral home smell."

"Yeah." Damon nods. "Funeral homes smell like flowers and chemicals."

"Probably so they don't smell like dead people," she conversationally adds.

"Probably," he agrees.

"Elena," I say.

"It's good he was drained first," she continues, as if I hadn't spoken. "It would smell worse if there'd been a lot of blood, wouldn't it? He would've smelled worse?" Neither of us move or answer her. "Because Conner didn't smell like this. He still smelled good enough to eat. It was really hard not to drain him before I buried him, actually. But he was fresh. This is different. This is the smell of dead Jeremy on my clothes and in my hair and on my skin, isn't it? My not-fresh brother? This is what my dead brother smells like after he sat around the house for a while after he died?"

"Here," Damon says, handing her the third drink she said she didn't want. She takes it from him anyway.

"You know this smell," she interrupts. She holds the glass to her lips but doesn't drink. "From when you were a soldier. Ric talked about the battlefields in class. But I can't imagine what they must've smelled like. Thousands of decaying bodies in the sun? All the dead horses, too. Since soldiers rode horses back then. All that rotting blood? I bet you could smell it for miles."

She finally takes a long sip. She doesn't know Damon doesn't talk about the war. He didn't even when he was alive. I asked similar questions long ago, and I got vague, non-answers. I kept asking anyway, trying to get him to talk, to tell me something. Anything. I pestered him, trying to catch him off-guard. I was there to wake him up when he was screaming in his sleep most nights, but he never said anything about it. And then we died, and it didn't seem to matter anymore. Except he still isn't talking about it, not even to her.

"I was human, then," he quietly answers, taking a sip of his own drink. "So it smelled differently to me then than it would now."

She nods. "That makes sense."

She holds out her glass and Damon, without prompting, takes it from her. Without so much as glancing at either of us, she strips off her shirt, which she throws unceremoniously into the fire. Then her bra. She stands there, topless, and pulls off her boots.

"Will these burn?" she asks Damon.

"Everything will burn," he answers. "Leather takes longer than fabric, but I can always get more wood, if need be."

Fucking Damon. He's not doing anything, and he's the only one she'd listen to right now. He could stop her, stop this insanity. Only he's not. Instead of telling her to not burn everything she owns, he's making sure she has enough fuel to finish the job.

She smells first one boot and then the other, shrugs, and lets them drop to the floor. Her socks are in the flames next, red and brown striped knee socks, surprisingly cute for clothing hidden from view. She pulls her phone from her back pocket and hands it to Damon before tugging off her jeans and panties in one movement, a teasing vision of blue lace partially concealed by denim, before she tosses them into the fire.

I prayed that I would be able to see her again, all of her. Every beautiful, amazing inch. I dared to hope that I would be worthy of her, feel her incredible flesh once more beneath my fingers. But not like this. This is not a fevered dream of desire. This is a fucking nightmare.

"Elena," I say again.

"Stefan, if you don't stop saying my name like I'm either deaf or crazy," she calmly says, as if we're discussing the weather. "I will stake you when you're sleeping, Stefan. You're a heavy sleeper, Stefan, so you won't wake up. We both know it, Stefan. Please don't think I'm joking, Stefan, because I'm very serious, Stefan. So. Stefan. Stop saying my fucking name."

I chance another quick glance at Damon, but he's looking at her.

Jesus.

"Who hasn't wanted to stake Stefan in his sleep?" Damon lightly says. "I'm pretty sure there's a long line of people waiting for that particular pleasure. Want to prank him instead? I've always been tempted to switch out his hair gel for super-glue. Or there's the trusty sugar in the gas tank or honey on the toilet seat. We're vampires, so that really opens up the playing field. I mean, anti-freeze instead of Listerine? That would be an instant classic! Just like summer camp."

"I went to summer camp," she says. "Some girls stole another girl's underwear. She refused to tell anyone what happened, so she waited until she thought we were all asleep and washed out the one pair she was wearing every night and walked around all day with a damp butt. In the end, it really wasn't funny."

"I never went to camp," Damon says with a smile. "But I've seen movies. I bet we could annoy Stefan to death, which would be more entertaining than a boring ol' stake through the heart."

"I'm going to take a shower," she calmly repeats.

She walks across the room, either oblivious or uncaring that she's naked. She doesn't hurry, taking the time to run her hand over the back of the sofa, caressing the decorative molding around the doorway, smoothing her way along the handrail of the stairs until she disappears from view.

We both swallow our drinks as the water starts in Damon's bathroom. He refills without asking if I want another.

"Well, that's new," he finally says.

"Jesus, Damon," I accuse. "What the hell were you thinking? What did you do?"

He looks like he might shatter his glass, his eyes flickering red, the black veins flashing down his cheeks before disappearing again.

"Fuck you, Stefan. What would you have had me do instead?"

"For starters, you could've stopped her from burning down the goddamn house."

He shrugs. "She needed to do that. It's just stuff. We can buy more. It's not healthy to hoard, Stefan."

Easy for him to say. The guy who only cares about his car and a leather jacket and a book and a pen. A fucking voicemail message I'd bet all my money he hasn't deleted. He could take everything he wants without packing a bag. What does he know about keepsakes? About memories? About holding onto treasures.

"You selfish bastard. This isn't about me. You were supposed to make her feel better, not make it worse."

He moves so fast my eyes don't track it. One moment, he's standing by the bar with a drink in his hand, and the next, I'm against the wall, the full force of his strength pinning me so I can't move. I struggle against him anyway, but he has no intention of letting me go.

"You want me to make it easier for you, brother," he spits out. "Not for her. For you. You think I want to see her like this? Fuck you, Stefan. Fuck you."

He steps away, and my feet drop a few inches, once again finding the floor. He retrieves his drink, which he hadn't even spilled, and drains it in a single swallow.

"You have the power to actually do something," I quietly say.

"Yeah." He snorts derisively. "I have the power to tell her that her love for her brother doesn't matter, that his death means nothing to her. I'll go upstairs and tell her that I want her to erase the memory of the person she loves more than anyone else on the planet 'cause that's the only way it's not going to fucking hurt. Sure, Stef. I'll get right on that. You're so goddamn worried about all her shit, but you want me to destroy the one thing she has left that matters?"

He pours another drink and swallows it angrily, his hand still on the decanter so he can immediately refill his glass.

"This is such bullshit, coming from you," he continues. "Mr. 'They're not puppets, Damon, they're people.'" He spits out the words in the voice he saves for when he's trying to sound like me. "Christ. I hate fucking hypocrites."

"Not forever, Damon," I cajole. "Just..."

"Just what?" he snaps. "Just until what? What can possibly happen that will make this better? What? If you have a grand solution, feel free to share because I'd fucking love to hear it."

I take a swallow of my drink instead of answering.

"Yeah. I didn't fucking think so. I did the only thing I could do. Because at least now, when she's ready, it'll all be waiting for her. All the fucking grief that's rightfully hers to feel because she deserves that. Jeremy fucking deserves it. To have her mourn him. And I won't take that from her even though I fucking want to. You think I don't want to? I would gladly bear every pain on this earth for her if I could, but I can't. I fucking can't. Because it's not mine. He's her brother, and I can't steal him from her, and fuck you for thinking I should. Fuck you, Stefan, you piece of fucking shit."

He throws his glass into the fire. It explodes against the back wall, the crystal shattering and the alcohol erupting into roaring flames.

"Fuck."

"But what do we do now?" I quietly ask. "She's capable of anything."

"Pots and kettles, brother," he says. "Aren't we all capable of anything? I told you: we'll watch over her, like we always have."

"Maybe we should lock her up?"

"Oh yeah, Stef. Solitary confinement is just what she fucking needs right now." He sneers at me. "What? Worried she just might stake you in your sleep?"

"She'd have every right," I whisper.

"Oh get over yourself," he snaps. "Stop being a goddamn martyr. It's not helpful to anyone, certainly not to her, and it's been boring as fuck to listen to for 170 years."

"Will you sleep with her tonight?" I can't stop myself from asking even though I don't want to know.

Damon sighs and drops onto the sofa and rests his head in his hands, as if it's suddenly too great a weight to bear. "God help me, but yes. If that's what she wants me to do. Yes. I'll do it. I'll do whatever she needs me to, be whatever she needs me to be." He moves his palms, as if he's wiping away evidence of more tears. "I'll be her fucking dildo, if that's what she wants. Or I'll sit outside her door down the hall. Or outside my door because she wants to claim my room for her own. It's all the same."

We are sired to her. All of us. Matt with his warm human arms and history of loyalty she can trust, the way he swallowed back his own grief today to be strong for her, this boy who's lost everyone, and now he lost his two best friends in the same day. Caroline with her lists and her casseroles and her cheerfully determined attempts to clean the floor because nothing is ever hopeless, and there's always something that can be set right, no matter how small. Even Meredith, who turned down the air-conditioner because Jeremy was decomposing in his bed and she wanted to let Elena keep him there as long as she needed.

None of us wants to make her unhappy.

The shower turns off, and Damon sighs before rising from the sofa, looking like his heart is breaking even as he's moving towards the thing that broke it in the first place.

"What are you doing to do?" I ask his retreating back.

He taps his ear. "First I'm going to grab some blood," he replies. "Because I could use a snack. Then I'm going to take a shower and go to bed. I've missed the comforts of home. Not really the camping type."

"Do you need me to do anything?"

He shakes his head. "Let's just get a good night's sleep."

"Because things always look so much better in the morning?" I sarcastically reply.

He turns, one foot on the bottom step. "We're vampires, Stefan. The rising sun just brings another variety of searing pain."

* * *

_A/N: Still feeling feelings? Hop on over to CreepingMuse's moving and poetic eulogy to the original Salvatore house, Brick By Brick. And then go see JWAB's tear-jerker of a reunion between Jenna and Jeremy, No Trace. _


	18. Purification - Part Two

_A/N: It should be quite obvious, but this picks up right where the last chapter left off, only now we're in Damon's POV. Serious about the M rating, gentle readers, and not just for language this time (although you know Damon and his foul mouth). Consider yourselves warned. Like compulsion, the show hasn't been forthcoming with switch details, so I'm making it up as I go. I'm running out of creative ways to say thank you to CreepingMuse for her incredible assistance, so I'll keep it simple: Thanks._

* * *

**Purification – Part Two**

"Let's just get a good night's sleep," I say, wishing like hell my room was empty so I could do just that. After the camping trip into hell and then today, I just want to take a shower and fall into my comfortable bed and pretend this has all been a very bad dream that will vanish when I open my eyes in the morning. But she's up there, and I need to take care of her, so I can't be a selfish dick.

"Because things always look so much better in the morning?" Stefan sarcastically replies.

He's standing in the doorway, leaning against the frame she absently stroked just minutes ago. Fucking Stefan and his sanctimonious sire-bond bullshit when it's not my fucking fault, and then he had the nerve to demand I control her with it because it'd be more convenient for him. If I didn't need him as backup right now to keep her from doing something she'll really regret, so help me, I'd help her stake him in his sleep. Fucking asshole.

I turn to face him, one foot on the bottom step. "We're vampires, Stefan. The rising sun just brings another variety of searing pain."

Fuck.

I sigh and start upstairs towards whoever and whatever is waiting for me in my room.

"Wait," he says.

"Jesus, Stefan," I snap. "What? What more can you possibly say to me right now that can't fucking wait?"

"Blood," he quietly answers. He taps his ear, as if I wasn't the one who just reminded him two fucking seconds ago that she can hear. "You forgot to grab some blood. I'll get it."

While he's down in the basement, I pull my phone from my pocket and text him:_ I'll try to keep her in my room. Stay downstairs. DO NOT FALL ASLEEP because you DO sleep like the fucking dead. Don't let her leave the house alone._

He returns just as I'm finishing typing. His phone vibrates in his pocket, and I nod towards it as I take the blood bags from him. I wait while he reads it, and he's about to type back when I shake my head and put my hand on his wrist to stop him.

Jesus. There's nothing else to fucking say. Get over it already.

I hand him both my phone and Elena's and nod towards the parlor. He hesitates, like he's going to argue with me, but then nods back, resigned. I hate that he's standing there, watching me walk upstairs into my own version of hell. Some fucking privacy, you twisted bastard? Not everyone likes an audience. I don't need witnesses, so fuck off, Stefan. Don't make this any harder 'cause it's fucking impossible as it is. But he stands there anyway, never taking silent hints. He needs engraved instructions, that one, and I don't have the energy to deal with him because I have to batten down the hatches, seal away everything that matters because I'm walking into the path of destruction that's wearing the face of the girl I love.

She's standing, naked and dripping water all over the floor, in front of my open closet. She flips through the orderly rows, pausing every so often to examine a shirt more closely or rub a certain fabric between her fingers.

"You have a lot of clothes," she observes, not turning to face me.

"I like clothes."

"You wear too much black."

"I look damn fine in black," I reply, entering the room and shutting the door behind me. "And bonus? Matching is one less thing to worry about."

"You're lying," she says without any passion or judgment. Just a statement of fact. "That's not true."

"Sure it is," I say. She turns towards me, surprise racing across her face before the bored expression returns. "It just isn't the entire truth."

"Hmmph." She turns her attention back to my clothes. "You would look nice in blue."

"So I've been told."

Christ, the women all want me to wear blue. The men too. Even Ric once commented that it'd really bring out my eyes. We were fucking wasted, and I laughed in his face to keep from punching him or kissing him or both, just to see what he'd do. I told him I'm not blind or stupid, I just happen to prefer black, although I do succumb to the occasional navy. He accused me of lying but didn't press because Ric and I didn't fuck with each other like that. We mostly just drank and didn't talk.

But no, I don't wear blue, no matter what it'd do for my eyes.

I let my boots thud to the floor and pull off my socks and toss them into the hamper.

"Drink?" I ask as I open one of the blood bags I brought up with me and pour it into a glass.

She holds out one hand, still not so much as even glancing at me, and she looks so much like Katherine, standing there expecting to be served. I could laugh. Or maybe cry.

Fuck. Fucking fuck fuck fuck.

Tighten up. Swallow it down. Bury it. Get through this for her. Forget everything else. She's the only thing that matters. She needs me. She needs me to be strong. I can't crack. I can't break. No room for error. Stop being a fucking pussy.

I place the glass in her hand without touching her and turn towards the bathroom so I don't have to watch her not looking at me anymore.

"I'm hopping in the shower unless you want me to get a different room."

"Why would I want that?"

I shrug before pulling my shirt over my head and dropping it in the hamper. "We have a whole house full of empty bedrooms. I could shower and sleep in another. No big deal."

"But this is your room."

"It is," I agree. "But as you recall, when you first came to stay here, you were invited to pick a room. You chose this one. I'm simply being a good host and respecting that choice."

"You have the best bathroom."

"Yep," I agree. "The best bed too. Custom made."

"What if I said I wanted to sleep in Stefan's room? Would you be jealous?"

"No," I say with a shrug. "Knock yourself out."

"I don't want to sleep with Stefan," she says. "I still think you're hot."

Right. It's all I'm good for. Fucking without any love. Without any feeling. It's all Katherine wanted from me, only I was too goddamn stupid to see it at the time. Fucking's all I did with the countless, meaningless people I've used and tossed aside or buried in shallow graves. Only one girl I've ever made love to, actually loved her with my body, and now she just wants a fuck. Because she's a horny new vampire and thinks I'm hot.

"That's because I am," I say with a grin, flashing her the eyes that used to make her run in the opposite direction.

She gulps the blood instead of responding. It's only when she hands me her empty glass and I know she doesn't want more that I pour the second bag into it and drink myself. Christ, it's been a long day. There isn't enough blood or bourbon in the world to drown this shit in.

She stands close, too fucking close because she might as well be on another fucking planet right now. But she's close enough that the droplets from her hair drip onto my bare chest. She reaches for my belt. Her fingers fumble with the buckle, but soon she's pulling it free from my pants.

She stares at my belt, running her fingers along the smooth surface, while I drop my pants and head to the bathroom. It's still moist and steamy from her shower, and the water takes just a second to run so hot it leaves red streaks down my chest.

I'm facing the wall when she steps in next to me, pressing her chest against my back.

I've wanted this. Needed this. Elena in my shower with me. My glorious shower that is perfection itself. I've jerked off too many times to count fantasizing about her in here with me, washing the smell of our sex off her skin so I can put it back again.

Fuck. Is this my fucking penance for spending all this time wanting my brother's girl? That it's exactly what I wanted but so incredibly wrong too?

I swallow several times as she wraps her arms around me from behind, her breasts soft against my back.

"I like your soap better than mine," she says.

"Good thing," I say, keeping my tone as nonchalant as hers. "Or we'd have to go shopping."

"I used to think mine smelled good." She rubs the bar in her hands until she's worked up a thick lather and carefully washes my back, her hands lingering on my skin long after it's clean. "But it's disgusting. I should've gotten rid of it right away instead of using it just because it was there. It stinks."

"I'm convinced the devil himself owns Bath and Body Works," I say, closing my eyes to concentrate on keeping my voice steady as her hands move down to my ass, slip between my cheeks. "Who the fuck wants to smell like fake fruit salad?"

"It's not what I expected."

"My soap?"

"The switch," she clarifies. "Turning off my humanity. I still feel like me. I didn't think I would. I thought I'd be..." Her voice trails off.

I turn and face her, gathering her hands in mine and holding them over my heart.

"You're always you," I say, as much to remind myself as to tell her. "That will never change. You're Elena Gilbert." I slowly raise her hands and kiss her soapy fingers.

"I thought I'd be a monster," she finishes, snatching her hands back from me. "I don't feel like a monster. But maybe that's the point of the switch? Do monsters know they're monsters? Or is it the not knowing that makes them monsters in the first place?"

I shrug. "It's different for everyone. There are humans who flip their switches and do terrible things without any guilt or feelings. Caroline's far less monstrous now than she was as a human."

"She hates you," she says indifferently.

"I know," I agree. "It's not a secret."

"But I think she has a thing for Stefan, along with Tyler and Klaus. Quite the slut, really, when you think about it."

"Let's not judge," I say. "They're all attractive, and being a vampire makes you..."

"Horny all the time?" Elena finishes for me. "She tried to get Stefan to like her instead of me when he first came to town. She was only with you because he wasn't interested, and she was trying to make me jealous. You were the other, less desirable brother."

"Been there," I say with a shrug. Fucking understatement. "I can live with that."

"Did you have your switch flipped when you fucked her?" she asks. "Were you you when you bit her and used her like one of those creepy dolls perverts buy on the internet?"

"I'm always me," I honestly tell her. "Just like you're always you."

"I don't understand."

I shake my head. "It's not a Get Out of Jail Free card, Elena. Stefan, even when he's turned off his humanity, hates the Ripper. That's why he tries to put the bodies back together. If he didn't care, he wouldn't try to make it right. Just like you are still going to be you, no matter what you do right now. All those feelings? They'll still there. So are the ones you're collecting along the way. They're just." I shrug. "Waiting. Think of it as putting a lid on a box. You can close it for a while, but you can't get rid of it."

"This doesn't make any sense," she huffs. "Why can't anything be simple?"

"Life is cruel?" I suggest.

"Is yours on?" she asks. "Your switch?"

I nod.

"Would you turn it off if I asked you to?"

I lean my head under the spray and lather my hair instead of answering.

"Would you?" she repeats.

"I don't completely understand how it works," I say. "I don't think anyone does. But Rose told me the switch has an expiration date. It only works for so long, and I'm getting close to mine not working anymore. So it was flipped, and then one day I realized it wasn't anymore, but I don't know exactly when or how it happened."

I don't tell her about standing in her room that night, watching her dream. Daring to touch the face that looked so much like Katherine's, only she wasn't Katherine. That moment when Elena became Elena to me, not just the girl who looked like Katherine or a way to torment Stefan.

She takes up the soap again, this time working her hands over my arms, my chest, my belly. She carefully attends to all my parts, my dick not caring that this is not the time, eagerly rising to meet her wet, slippery hands.

I can't do this. I fucking can't take her hands that are Elena's hands but not Elena's hands, and they're on my cock, and my cock doesn't care that it's Elena but not really Elena. But I do. I care. I care so fucking much I want to run away. I want more hot water. I need to scald off my fucking skin so she doesn't have anything to touch with those little hands that are both hers and not hers anymore.

Fuck.

I'm about to use the sire bond, tell her it would make me happy if she'd just stop touching me, when she stops on her own, leaning back to let the water fall over her back.

Without her hands on me I can breathe again. I can think. I need to keep my shit together.

I can do this.

And she's Elena. She's still Elena. Just like I won't let her forget that, I won't forget either.

This is Elena.

"Why turn it off if it doesn't do anything?" she asks. "If we're still us? If all that misery is still there? Why bother?"

"I didn't say it doesn't do anything," I respond. "I meant it when I said you're still you. Just you without the part that cares what other people think, that cares for other people's feelings. You know all the smart-ass comments you think but never say?"

She looks away from me and squats down so she can wash my legs, my feet. I smile. This isn't so hard. She's still in there. She's still Elena.

"Oh yeah. You're a closet smart-ass for sure. You'll probably say them now. You won't have the filter that stops you."

She's so beautiful. Wet and standing with me in my shower.

Christ, I love this girl. Even like this, I love her. I'll always love her. No matter what.

Elena.

"You'll feel pleasure." I stroke a single finger underneath her breast before turning her around and washing her back because she probably missed a spot when she showered before and I don't want any lingering scent of Jeremy left to haunt her sleep. "You'll feel the heady intoxication of feeding," I whisper into her ear, my soapy hands working the tightness out of her muscles. "The oblivion of the blood. You'll get lost in sensations, in the way things feel and smell and taste. You'll think, at least for a little while, that these things are the same as happiness. But they aren't. Because you can't feel the good without feeling the bad. And eventually not feeling anything will be worse than letting all the pain and grief and misery back in."

"Did you turn it off right away?"

I shake my head. "No."

I don't tell her about Stefan going to Egypt without me. About how much he hated me and blamed me. I don't tell her I turned it off because I loved my brother more than anyone, even Katherine, and I thought I'd lost him forever and I couldn't stand the fucking pain.

She doesn't protest when I turn off the water and reach for a towel. Standing there next to her, steam rising from our skin, I carefully towel her hair before drying her off, dropping to my knees to get her feet and between her toes. Wrapping the damp towel around my waist and a clean one around her, I lead her out of the shower and gently push her down onto the stool before the mirror. Her gaze is distant and unfocused as I drag the comb through her hair, working out all the tangles. I continue combing long after it's smooth, the repetitious movements soothing.

"You cried," she finally says. It's not a question. "In the car, on the way here, you cried."

I clear my throat and nod. "How do you know?"

"I smelled it," she says. "The wind blew the smell right in my face."

There's my clever girl. "Tears do smell distinctive. Subtle. Not like blood, but different for every person."

"I knew it was definitely you and not Stefan."

I nod again.

"Why? Why did you cry? Was it for Jeremy? Or the house? Did you cry because I was humming that stupid song from the last time we fucked?"

Fuck. For a word I love to use, I hate the sound of it falling casually out of her mouth to describe that beautiful, awkward moment we shared in the backseat of my car. That was the opposite of fucking, and her calling it that feels like blasphemy.

Yes and no, truth and lies and everything in between, all of it happening at the same time. Yes, I cried because this girl who looks like Elena and is still Elena but isn't Elena was in the backseat of my car humming "Sugar Sugar." And yes, I cried for Jeremy. And for all the people we've lost. I cried for Stefan. For Ric. For the fucking teddy bear that's nothing but ash because I understand why Elena needed to burn down the goddamn house but I also know one day she's going to want that fucking bear and her mother's pearls and her father's family history and Jeremy's drawings and they're gone. They're all gone, and I'll be as useless on that day, when she wants her things that she can't ever have again, as I was today. I cried for me because without her, I'm lost too. I shed a single tear for all the times I should've cried but didn't, for all the times I wanted to but couldn't.

Yes. Fuck me, but yes. I cried.

"Down or up?" I ask her instead of answering.

She smiles, but it doesn't reach her eyes. "I didn't know you did hair."

"I'm a man of many talents," I answer. She gets up without commenting, wandering back into my room. I pull out a long-sleeved t-shirt and hand it to her.

"Why?" she asks, dropping the towel so she's standing naked again. Bare before me, in every sense of the word. Stripped of everything that makes her Elena. "You once said that you'd throw a dollar at me if you saw something new." She looks around. "I don't see any dollars."

"I don't want you to get cold," I say.

"I'm a vampire, Damon. I don't get cold like that anymore." But she takes the shirt and pulls it on anyway. It barely covers all her essentials. "I like your clothes."

"I do too," I say. "I like how they look on you."

"I like how they feel. They feel better than Stefan's. Than mine. I used to think you were a snob. Or maybe just vain, like that song my mom used to listen to. But it's not that. You like how they feel too."

"Anything worth doing," I say. "We'll go shopping, if you want. Take a trip, maybe? Few days out of town?"

"Are they expensive?" she asks. "Clothes that feel this nice?"

"Of course they are. You get what you pay for."

"I wouldn't have to pay," she says. "If I didn't want. I could just take them."

I smile. "Would you like that? A haute couture version of Bonnie and Clyde? We'll compel the witnesses so all they remember is a fashionably dressed girl no one can describe."

She giggles and rolls up the sleeves and rests her hands on her hips.

"Tired?" I ask. "Want to try and get some sleep?"

She shakes her head. "What are we going to do?"

"Whatever you want," I say.

"Whatever I want?" She throws back her head and laughs, a joyless, awful sound that rings too loudly in my ears. "Whatever I want?" she repeats.

"Yes," I whisper.

She steps away from me and wanders towards my closet again. When she turns around, my belt is coiled in her hands.

"What if I said I wanted Stefan to watch us fuck? Or if I wanted to watch you and Stefan fuck?"

I shrug, calling her bluff. "Whatever. I say 'fucking Stefan' a lot. I think it even more. Never really considered it as a verb. More just an expression. But I'm game, if that's what you want to do."

"You've had sex with men?" she asks, looking surprised.

"Of course."

"Has Stefan?"

"Stick around long enough," I say. "And there's not much you haven't tried, if only out of boredom or curiosity. I've never fucked Stefan though. That would be a new one."

She doesn't respond, just stands in the middle of my room, suddenly looking lost. I don't know what flippped Elena does when she's scared or confused or uncertain, and I don't want to find out. Not tonight. Jesus, I can't take anymore tonight. It's been a terrible, very bad day without adding that revelation to the list of all the things that went wrong. So I redirect before she gets flustered, using the one thing I know she still wants.

"Where do you want me?"

"Drop the towel," she orders. I immediately do as she asks. "Lay on the bed."

"Sunnyside up?" I ask.

She shakes her head. "I don't know what that means."

I hop onto the bed, trying to keep it playful even as her hands worry my favorite Hermès belt, which worries the fuck out of me.

"Face up or down?"

She's agitated, biting her bottom lip with her top teeth. I can tell she doesn't know what to do with me now that she has me here, and the confusion is upsetting her.

"It's okay," I soothe. "No hurry. Take as long as you want. But do you want to tie me up with that belt? Hit me with it?"

Fuck. This is a terrible idea. I've had really terrible ideas before. I'm known for doing stupid things. I keep thinking I can't get any more idiotic, but this wins the fucking prize. Stefan, you'd damn better well be vigilant 'cause she's about to take me out of commission unless I break my fucking arms or my bed.

"Elena?" I quietly ask.

She looks down at the belt in her hands as if she's never seen it before, even as her fingers stroke the leather. "I think I want to tie you up."

"Okay," I calmly agree.

This is a terrible fucking idea. My worst idea ever.

"You have to have an idea of what you want to do with me," I say. "Or you'll go to a lot of trouble and have me in the wrong place."

She nods. "Right."

"So are you planning on fucking me?" I ask, keeping my voice calm and neutral.

Fuck.

"With your fingers or your fist or something else, or do you want me to be hard so you can use me to get off? What you're in the mood for depends on how I need to be positioned."

Oh god. Oh my fucking god.

She nods again. "Face up." I move to situate the pillows, taking deep breaths while my back is turned so she can't see, but she cracks the belt across the back of my thighs. I grimace but don't make a sound. "No." she says. She throws all the pillows onto the floor. "Just lay down."

She needs this. She needs me to do this. So I do as she asks and hold my hands in front of her, wrists pressed together. She slips my belt around them and pulls it tight.

"That's right," I quietly encourage her. "Nice and tight. You're going to have to make a new hole, though. Use a fang."

She looks at me, shocked. "Isn't this really expensive?"

"About a thousand bucks," I answer. Her eyes go wide. "It's just a belt, Elena. It'll have character now, or I'll buy another one. It doesn't matter." She doesn't move to punch the necessary hole. "Want me to do it?" She shakes her head, vamps out, and pierces the leather with one fang so the platinum prong is anchored securely. "Good," I tell her. "Now, do you want just my hands bound, or do you want me attached to the bed?"

Christ, I deserve this. For everything I've done. I deserve to have her use me like this. It's my turn to be a living version of a creepy doll perverts buy on the internet. And at least it's me. She's using me and fucking me and not hurting anyone else because when it's all over, when Elena comes back, none of this will matter because it's only me.

She worries her lip for a second time while she thinks. "The bed too," she finally says, nodding her head. "Yeah."

"Okay, you're going to need some rope. There's a box of it on the shelf in the closet." I point with my bound hands. "On the left."

She comes back to the bed with the box, opening the lid to reveal different lengths and types and colors, all neatly coiled and stacked.

"Do you know how to tie a square knot?" I ask, counting on her inexperience to not know it's a knot that'll give way if I need it to, preferably without breaking my bed. My arms will heal. The bed? Not so much. She shakes her head. "Do you want me to explain how, or would you rather untie me for a minute so I can do it for you?"

She doesn't answer, but slips the belt off my wrists.

"Here, I'll show you." I pull out the rope I want to use and hold them up so she can see. "There's a little rhyme. It's how I taught Stefan. It goes 'right over left, left over right, makes a knot both tidy and tight.'" I hold up the secured end of the belt. "Want to see it again?"

She rolls her eyes. "No. This still isn't camp."

Once more I offer her my wrists, and she quickly binds them again, this time moving around the bed, securing the ends of the ropes. She steps back to admire her handiwork, and I look back at her, taking measured breaths, making sure my expression is unashamed and without accusation or fear.

I love her. Christ, I love her. It's okay. It's going to be okay.

"Did Katherine do this to you?" she finally asks.

"No," I say. "I was only with Katherine when I was human. She didn't need to restrain me. In fact, she had to be very careful so she didn't hurt me."

"Am I just like her now?" she asks. "Seems redundant, to have two of us, now that we're both cold-hearted, vampire bitches."

"No," I say again. "You're not Katherine. You'll never be Katherine. You're still you, Elena."

"Stop saying that."

"But you are," I insist. I love you, Elena. I know you don't care about that right now, but don't forget. Please don't forget. I love you. "You're Elena Gilbert."

"Stop looking at me. I don't want you to look at me."

She flashes over to the closet and pulls out a tie. She quickly ties it around my eyes, the silk soft against my face, the darkness completely enveloping me. I open my mouth, but she pushes her hand over it, pressing hard enough to smash my lips painfully against my teeth.

"No talking. If you say another word, I'll gag you."

I nod to show her I understand and am willing to play by her rules.


	19. Purification - Part Three

**Purification – Part Three **

"Am I just like her now?" I ask because Damon always tells the truth, even if sometimes it's just part of the truth. Damon's part of the truth is better than everyone else's lies. But isn't that why doppelgangers exist? Because we're exactly the same so the spell will work again?

"Seems redundant," I say, "to have two of us, now that we're both cold-hearted, vampire bitches."

I like that. I'm a cold-hearted, vampire bitch. Yes. Katherine seems to have more fun being a bitch. I want to have fun. Maybe I'll start curling my hair. I like curls. It always seemed like too much work, but I have all the time in the world to curl my hair, if that's what I want to do. Maybe I'll shake my head like Rita Hayworth does in that old black and white movie. Maybe I'll start wearing stilettos, too. They're probably easier to walk in now that I'm a vampire, and it won't matter if I break an ankle.

"No," Damon quietly says. "You're not Katherine. You'll never be Katherine. You're still you, Elena."

"Stop saying that."

I don't want to be Elena. I'm tired of feeling sad all the time. Being nice. Doing the right thing. Smiling when I don't want to and acting like I care when I really don't. I'm tired of worrying about what everyone is thinking and feeling, and I'm tired of going to those stupid Founder's parties that are boring and someone always just ends up dead. I'm tired of all the lying.

"But you are," he insists. "You're Elena Gilbert."

He's tied up in his bed. Naked. Like I crucified him. Or he crucified himself, since he's the one who showed me how to do it. I can see where the belt is digging into his wrists, and I imagine his shoulders are starting to hurt stretched the way they are, but he doesn't complain. He could probably snap his belt easily enough if he wanted to get free. I can't imagine he'd actually let me tie him up so he couldn't get away if I started a fire in this house too.

But he won't. Not Damon. He'd let me chew off his arms, if I said that's what I wanted to do. Was he like this with Katherine? Loving and accepting and trusting, no matter what she did? Did she make Damon watch while she fucked Stefan, or did he just know she was with them both? Maybe that's why Katherine likes Stefan better, because he's a liar. Maybe after five hundred years of killing and running and hiding and not giving a shit about anyone but herself, maybe the idea of a human who loved her without compulsion and looked her in the eyes and told the truth was just too much to take.

He's looking at me the way Damon has always looked at me, like he really sees me. He cuts through all the bullshit and sees what's really there. Damon tells the truth because he hates lies even when knowing the truth hurts him. He tells the truth even though everyone hates him for saying the real things no one wants to hear.

He looks at me like he still loves me.

"Stop looking at me," I say. "I don't want you to look at me."

He immediately closes his eyes, but I go to his closet anyway. For all his clothes, he doesn't have a lot of ties. My dad had tons. Rows and rows of ties. Most were doctor themed because his patients gave him ties as presents. Everyone gave him ties. He must've been sick of opening flat boxes with ties in them. He wore a tie every day to work, and he went months without repeating. I don't know what happened to all of them. Jenna took over their closet, so they weren't hanging there. Maybe she gave them away. Maybe they're burning in a box in the attic right now.

I let my fingers slide over Damon's ties, deciding which one I want. Like his shirts, they feel good. Silk, I guess. Thick. Slippery. Smooth. I rub my cheeks against them. They smell like Damon. I choose the black one he wore to Miss Mystic Falls last year, when he and I danced because Stefan stood me up to eat Amber Bradley in the parking lot.

It feels the best in my hand.

I tie it around his eyes, and he even lifts his head for me, so I don't have to work too hard to blindfold him. He opens his mouth, like he's going to say something, and I don't want to hear it. I don't want to hear that I'm still me and he loves me and everything is fine even though this is about as not fine as it gets but somehow that doesn't seem to matter to him. I can't hear his calm, patient voice that's screaming "I love you! Elena, don't forget that I love you!" no matter what words he's actually saying.

I can't hear him right now or have him look at me. I just can't, and I don't want to.

I push my hand over his mouth, pressing down so hard it must hurt. He doesn't make a sound, but his head sinks into the mattress to get away from me.

"No talking," I order him. "If you say another word, I'll gag you."

I don't know if I actually could gag him. I'd have to ask him how, and asking him would require talking, which would defeat the purpose of gagging him.

As soon as I lift my hand so he can move his head, he nods his consent and lays there, unmoving and silent like I knew he would. I kneel at the foot of the bed, smoothing my hand along his sheets. God, I love his sheets. Like his shirts, I never knew cotton could feel so soft and wonderful. I was so busy before, feeling feelings, so wrapped up in my own sad, whiny head and all the worries about other people and how they felt and what they were thinking and feeling. My God, so many feelings I thought they would explode out of my chest and ooze like blood and run down my legs into a puddle on the floor. Or maybe, since the heart in my chest isn't actually where feelings are, just where they feel, maybe they'd seep out of my ears and my eyes and my nose. Feelings dripping like tears or snot. Projectile feelings like vomit because there were so many. I was drowning in feelings and couldn't feel anything else.

But now that I'm not feeling all those feelings, I want to feel the other ones. The ones I've been missing. I want to roll around in dewy grass and race barefoot across the rug in the parlor. I want to wrap myself in Damon's sheets and feel his hands on my body and his tongue in my mouth. I want to soak in his tub and take another shower just to feel the water falling down my back. I want it to rain so I can dance naked on the roof.

I want to touch everything.

I want him to touch me. I want to feel his fingers on my skin and the cool metal of his ring and the sharp points of his fangs and the silken strands of his hair. I want to feel just that and not all the feelings I used to feel when he touched me, all the guilt and the shame and worry. Except I tied him up because I didn't want him to look at me, and now he can't do anything but lay there.

I'm not as stupid or innocent as everyone seems to think. I was 13 when I found the under-the-bed box full of my mom's books. Like one of those fancy stores with all the different flavors of jellybeans to choose from, only instead of candy it was a box of sex.

There was a really old copy of the Kama Sutra with intricate sketches on fragile, yellowed paper my dad had given her for their first anniversary, the paper anniversary. I was horrified and disgusted and the inscription made me snap the book closed and I didn't ever open that one again.

I read those books while the blood rushed to my face and wetness I didn't understand pooled between my legs. My mom never said anything, just like we never commented when we all knew Jeremy was whacking off in his room. He took absurdly long showers and we suddenly went through twice as much conditioner as we used to.

I left the box under the bed after my parents died, but I moved it under my bed when Ric moved in with us, even though he spent the summer sleeping on our couch.

They're all gone now, too. My dad's stupid ties and my mom's sexy books. Paper isn't a very good token for an anniversary, now that I think about it. Not durable at all. Maybe that's why they get it out of the way early, in case the marriage doesn't work out and you can set everything that matters on fire and start over without twisted lumps of metal left in the ashes.

My mind is wandering like it hasn't since my parents died. Damon said the switch was like a lid on a box, and now that this lid is closed, I can open all the other lids on all the other boxes again. Before, thinking and feeling was like navigating a mine field. Every step, no matter how tentative, could blow up the whole thing, the fragile house of cards where I had to live because all the sturdiness that mattered was gone.

The switch isn't like I thought it would be though. When I told Jenna she should flip her switch the night of the sacrifice so she wasn't afraid, that was a lie. I don't know if she flipped it or not, but even if she did, she was still afraid. She was still confused. Those things are still here with me, so they would've been with her too. But she wasn't worried about me or Jeremy or Ric. Maybe she died feeling the individual pieces of dirt between her fingers and smelling the grass and listening to the way the wind rustled the leaves of the trees. Maybe she noticed that flames aren't just orange like I used to think they were, but red and yellow and purple and blue and black and white and, at the very center where surely it's the hottest, there's a color I don't even have a name for.

Stefan should have explained it to me better.

Actually, Stefan should've done a lot of things differently. He's attractive, yes. I can't deny that. Those soulful green eyes and carefully messed-up hair and chiseled muscles in his arms. But he's a liar. I fell in love with a lie, and he knew it was a lie, and he let me do it anyway.

I flash to the bedroom door and open it wide. Let him listen.

But now I'm back to not knowing what to do with Damon now that he's showed me how to tie him up in his bed. This isn't as much fun as I thought it would be. I didn't like hitting him with the belt either. I don't know why I did it. The belt was in my hand, and he'd turned around, and in those books people beat each other. Except it wasn't sexy. I didn't like the cracking sound or the way it vibrated in my hand when it hit him. I didn't like how he tensed when it landed on the back of his thighs. I didn't like the angry red welt that immediately appeared, only to disappear because he's a vampire. He didn't say anything because he's Damon, but that had to really hurt and I don't want to hurt him. That wasn't fun.

I kneel back down at the end of the bed, and he still hasn't moved, hasn't made a sound. How long has it been? How long have I been sitting here just looking at him naked and blindfolded and not moving while thinking about all these other things? I look around and realize Damon doesn't have a clock in his room. Maybe time doesn't matter when you're a vampire and it stretches out before you, infinite and unrelenting and for always. Maybe he doesn't care if he's late. Maybe he doesn't like the sound of it ticking.

I want to untie him and ask him questions and know he's telling me the truth because that's what Damon does. But he's here now, and I should do something with him. What would Katherine do if she had Damon tied up and blindfolded? She wouldn't just sit and have a chat. She would think of something fun.

I can be fun.

My hands start at his feet. He twitches just a little when I first touch him before laying perfectly still again. Is it because my hands are cold, or because it's been so long he thought I wasn't going to do anything? Did he get bored, or maybe fell asleep? Is he afraid? Part of me wants to know what he's been thinking all this time, laying there not able to see or move, trapped in the dark and his own thoughts. Does he have wandering thoughts like I do? Are his thoughts as neat as the coils of rope in the box in his closet, or are they all over the place like mine, twisted and tangled and spilling over the edges?

Why does he have a box of ropes in his closet?

I put one hand on each foot and close my eyes and make all the other thoughts go away. I dreamed of his feet and woke up crying when I was banished from the lake house. He's never barefoot so there's something vulnerable about his toes. He always wears boots, even in the house, like at any moment he's expecting to run or fight or kick someone's ass or rip out a heart. It'd be harder to do all that in bare feet.

I open my eyes so I can see his feet. I stroke his toes and the flawless pale skin. They're even more beautiful than I imagined. His toes are long and graceful, like his fingers, and they're perfectly proportioned, not like some feet that have a longer second toe or a tiny, squashed up little toe. They're clean and smooth, the nails exactly the same length and neatly trimmed and filed. I can tell he takes care of them, even though he never shows them to anyone.

He doesn't have a lot of hair on his legs, or anywhere else, for that matter. I like that. Not waxed smooth like those actors in the movies, but not all gross and furry either. Just right. And his hair is fine and very dark and downy soft. I run my hands over it, not touching his skin, just the hair.

"Open your legs more," I say, and I work my way up to the inside of his knees, the tops of his thighs.

"Bend your knees."

He immediately plants both feet on the bed so his knees are up, his legs spread. I've seen him before, although not like this. I've never felt him without feelings. He's never been completely still and quiet in a brightly lit room where I can look and not have him looking back at me. That would be too much right now, if he were looking or talking or touching me back.

The underside of his knees is soft, and I remember how good it felt when he kissed me there. I settle myself between his legs and dip my head so I can taste the backs of his knees. I lick, loving the way his skin feels against my tongue, and I suck at the folds of skin there. He smells like Damon and soap and his skin tastes even better than it smells. I feel the heat of the veins around my eyes and the sharp points of my fangs in my mouth.

I move up, dragging first one fang and then the other along his inner thigh where the skin is smooth and hairless. Once more he twitches beneath me, and I slide my hands along the length of his legs, my fingers exploring the lean lines of muscles and tendons and feel the way his blood moves beneath the skin. I lick at the artery there, first on one leg, then moving to the other, paying equal attention to both sides. I run my nose and lips along it, luxuriating in the feel of Damon and the smell of Damon. I pierce him there, just with one fang, so that droplets of blood appear like jewels before the tiny wound heals. I lap them up, and Damon tastes even better than he feels and smells. For just a second I think I could just spend the rest of my life here between his legs, just feeling.

But his blood on my tongue makes my own blood race. I feel the heat between my thighs and the wetness that collects there because he is perfection itself.

I want him.

I nose my way further, burying my face in the silky weight of his balls. They slide loosely in their skin as I take first one and then the other into my mouth, careful not to scratch the tender flesh with my fangs. His cock is hard and twitching when I move lower, like people did in my mom's sexy books, to the dark, secret place hidden between his legs. I always wondered what that would be like, to lick and touch there, but I was too embarrassed to find out. It's puckered and beautiful and the same shade of pink as the head of his cock. I swipe my tongue against it while he stifles a moan I wouldn't have been able to hear if I were human.

His thighs are trembling now and his jaw is clenched tightly and he's biting his bottom lip so hard he's drawing droplets of blood with his fangs. I lick those too, tracing the outline of his mouth and the line of his jaw up to where the tie crosses his face.

"Put your legs down," I whisper through the silk covering his ears so I can straddle him, and his mouth captures one of my nipples.

"Bite me."

There's the sting of his teeth sinking into my skin but the softness of his lips and the wet velvet of his tongue lapping at the blood before the wounds close.

His cock throbs and leaves wet trails on his belly that I dip down to lick before rubbing my clit against him, gasping at the pleasure I feel. It slides slickly against me, the skin so soft even though it's deliciously hard. Once more he bites his lip so he doesn't cry out, and my tongue tastes his blood and wants more.

"No words," I tell him as I grind myself against him. "But you don't have to be silent."

Sound rushes out of him that's a hum and a gush and a moan and a chant. He sucks in a noisy, ragged breath and presses his lips together and moves his head back and forth against the sheet. His arms struggle for the first time against the belt that's restraining them.

I finally give in to what I want and put him right where he needs to be. I close my eyes and drape myself across his chest while he fills me. It feels so good to have my clit pressed tightly against his pubic bone and his cock hard inside me and all his smooth skin touching mine.

"Yes," I gasp before my mouth finds his. His tongue is immediately pressed against my lips, asking for admittance, and yes, I want it. I want to feel him. All of him. His fangs dig into my lips, and I know he's tasting my blood.

I move my hips, and he raises his to meet me. The bed creaks in protest as he pulls against the belt. He whimpers when I break our kiss, but only for a second because I brace my arms against his strong thighs and move like I couldn't have ever moved when I was just a girl.

I'm so wet and dripping and it doesn't last nearly long enough. I scream because my clit is rubbing just right and his cock is hitting that spot.

I don't have feelings anymore so all I can feel are these feelings. And if this is what it's like, I'm never feeling the other kinds of feelings ever again.

I'm still clenching around him when he cries out and the bed creaks and he squeezes his legs together as if he would hold me close to him if only he could reach. He pulses and throbs and his flood of wetness enters me. I collapse back onto his chest because it all just feels so perfectly good.

We're both gasping when he moves his head just a little bit so his cheek is pressed against mine. I feel the silk of the tie and the stubble on his cheek.

I don't know how long we lay there, his cheek resting against mine, him silent once again and unmoving beneath me. I feel him soften and naturally slip out, and the absence of him leaves me feeling cold and damp and empty.

I get up from the bed and wet a washcloth in the bathroom and wipe away all the fluids, mine and his mixing together until it's one big mess. When I'm clean, I grab a fresh cloth and wet it and carry it back to the bed. He jumps just a little when I clean him, but otherwise he remains still.

The overnight bag I brought over when Jeremy was trying to kill me is still sitting in the corner where I left it. There's not much in there, but I slip on a pair of panties because dripping would be gross. I don't like this underwear anymore, and I wish Damon's would fit me because I bet his feel as good as the rest of his clothes, even though something tells me he doesn't wear underwear very often.

I use Damon's toothbrush in the bathroom and pull my hair back into a messy twist.

I can hear Stefan downstairs, the quiet crackling of the fire as it burns low in the hearth. I walk down, placing each foot on each smooth step, running it back and forth across the wood before taking another and letting my hand glide over the rail.

Stefan's sitting in the parlor on the sofa, a drink in one hand and an open book in his lap. He's looking at the page, but I can tell he's not really seeing it. He's lost in thought, the book just something to hold in his hands. No doubt Damon asked him to stay awake, to make sure I didn't run off into the night and burn down anything else.

"Are you the guard?" I ask from the doorway. Stefan jumps just a little when he hears me and sheepishly looks up. Yeah, I could've gotten out the door without him even noticing. "Are you here to stop me from making a mess?"

"You're not a prisoner," he says, closing the book and setting it aside. "Liz called. I hope you don't mind I answered your phone. She's handling things with the Fire Marshall for now, but you'll have to go in for an interview at some point, and there'll be reports and paperwork. They're going to officially declare it an accident. Faulty wiring."

I hadn't thought about all the paperwork with the burned house. That'll be even more tedious and boring than planning another funeral, which I'll have to do too. Maybe I can compel my way out of it. And at least there won't be a lot of Jeremy left to bury. I won't have to pick out a coffin this time or decide what clothes he should be wearing so everyone can look at him and comment on how peaceful he looks when really he just looks dead. Maybe they'll scoop some of the ashes into an urn, and maybe it'll be Jeremy, but maybe it'll be the couch or the walls or something else too. But we'll have to bury it and pretend like it's him because that's what people do. At least you can bury urns on top of coffins, so he can go in the family plot and I won't have to pick out another place in the cemetery.

"Faulty wiring?" I say. "That's the same excuse they used for my dad's office when John burned all the tomb vampires and Tyler's dad. You'd think, after 200 years, they would've thought of something more convincing than faulty wiring and gas leaks and animal attacks."

He nods. "Yeah."

"Really not very creative of them."

I pick up the book and look at the worn cover. It falls open to where Stefan's tucked a letter in between the pages. I flip through and see many more, lots of letters, all the yellowed envelopes addressed to Stefan in Damon's impeccable and distinguished handwriting. At the back, there's an old tintype of Damon and Stefan, obviously still human. Damon's wearing a Confederate uniform, Stefan a suit. Stefan looks stiff and serious, but there's a hint of a smile turning up the corners of Damon's mouth. He has his arm around Stefan, his hand a little blurry as it rests on Stefan's shoulder. He must've been moving.

"_Grey's Anatomy_?" I ask. "That's an interesting choice. I'd think you'd know all about what the insides of people look like by now."

"Wasn't in the mood to follow a plot," he quietly replies.

I read the inscription, dated November 5, 1860. It's not signed, but it's obviously written by Damon too. "Damon gave you this book."

"For my birthday, the year before he went to war."

"You wanted to be a doctor," I say, letting the book drop back to the sofa.

He nods. "It's one of the few things I have from when I was still human."

"Is that where you kept Katherine's picture too?"

"Where's Damon?" Stefan asks instead of answering.

"Tied up in his bed."

Stefan swallows and worry lines appear between his eyes.

"He showed me how to do it. He used a knot he said he taught you how to make."

"Is he okay?"

"He's probably uncomfortable," I admit. "But I didn't stake him or leave him bleeding out the ass, if that's what you're asking."

He swallows again. "No, I wasn't asking that."

"Of course not. You could hear everything. I left the door open on purpose."

While he stares at me, mouth gaping, I lay down on the rug, feeling the wool between my fingers. I roll over and bury my nose in it, smelling dirt from shoes and ash from fires and bourbon and books and ink and Damon and Stefan and me and grass and maybe lavender and blood, yes blood too, and coffee and too many scents to name. I rub my cheek against it, the wool rough and tickling at the same time. I scissor my bare legs against it and dig in my toes so I can feel as much of it as I can. I wiggle my hips so it rubs just right against my still-tingling clit. I even lick my tongue against the roughness, just to see what it tastes like.

"Elena?" Stefan quietly asks, interrupting.

"Damon cleans the house, not you," I say.

"What makes you think that?" he asks.

"Your room is the only one that's dusty."

He ruefully chuckles. "There's a crew that comes once a week. They do everything except our rooms and the basement. I keep thinking I should let them have a pass at my room, but in the end, I can't stand the idea of strangers touching my things."

"He cleans in between, though," I say. "He must."

Stefan nods. "Yeah. He has a really sensitive sense of smell, even for a vampire. And he likes things to be in their place. Kind-of OCD, really. He's always been that way, even when we were kids."

"Is that when he showed you how to tie knots?"

"Damon showed me how to do lots of things. We had." He sighs. "I guess you'd call her a nanny."

"She was a slave?"

"Yes," he quietly says. "And we had tutors."

"Not slaves?"

"No. Men hired to prepare us for university. But Damon's the one who showed me how to tie knots, how to whittle without cutting myself, what to do when I did cut myself, how to start a fire in the rain, how to ride a horse."

"So what he said before about not going to summer camp wasn't true," I say. "Your entire childhood was like summer camp."

I can hear it when he smiles. "Not exactly, but there are definite similarities."

"Smells don't bother you?" I ask.

He shrugs. "Not like they do him. For a long time, when I was drinking only animal blood, I didn't smell that differently from a human."

"And you're probably trying not to tear into people most of the time, so what's a little dust here and there when you're concentrating on not eating your friends?"

Stefan clears his throat. "Something like that," he quietly says.

"You killed Andie."

There's a long enough pause that I roll onto my back so I can see him. He's staring into the dying embers and avoiding looking at me.

"Damon told you?" he finally asks.

"Of course not," I say. "But you didn't eat her. You didn't rip her apart like all those other people from the newspaper articles Damon tried to hide from me. He worried about what I would feel when I found out the truth about you."

"Elena," he begins.

"You didn't light your lantern for Andie at the memorial. When we lit lanterns for people who died. You had plenty of your own kills to mourn, but you lit your lantern for people Damon killed."

He swallows the rest of his drink and stands up. "I need another drink. You want one?"

"No," I say. "I need to know the truth. I need to know why you feel sad and guilty for the things he's done when you have plenty of your own things to feel guilty about."

He stands with his back to me and swallows the drink. He pours another before answering.

"I don't know."

"You're lying," I say. "I'm not going to waste my time talking to you if you're just going to lie. You've always lied to me. It's annoying."

I stand up and start walking out of the room.

"Elena, please, wait," he says. "I. Um. I didn't mean to lie to you."

"When?" I ask, not turning around because I know he's not going to look at me anyway so why bother. "Which lie didn't you mean?"

"Elena," he whispers.

"I'm leaving now, Stefan," I say.

"Um," he stammers. "I don't think it'd be a good idea if you. Um."

"I'm going upstairs to bed," I clarify. "You won't have to chase me down and haul me back to the dungeon, kicking and screaming."

I walk back to him, standing so I'm almost but not quite touching him. He hasn't showered. He smells like bourbon and the dusty book and Jeremy and smoke and ashes.

"Although according to the newspapers, you like the chase. The rush of the hunt is even more thrilling than the kill."

"Elena, please," he whispers.

"Is that what they say to you?" I ask. "Before you kill them? Do you like it when they beg for their lives? Do you get off when they realize there won't be any mercy?"

"Elena," he says again.

"I'm going to bed," I repeat, stepping away from him and heading towards the stairs. He's not going to answer honestly anyway. "I promise I won't leave the house without supervision. At least not today. We'll renegotiate tomorrow. And you need to shower because you stink like my dead brother."

I don't look back as I walk upstairs, once again taking my time, running my fingers over all the beautiful surfaces of the house Damon cleans so they aren't grimy or dusty or sticky.

I close Damon's door and immediately unbuckle the belt. As soon as he's free, Damon flashes out of the bed. I sit in the leather chair in the corner and watch as he opens a drawer with one hand while working the tie off his face with the other. He pulls on a pair of black sleep pants that hang low on his hips.

He quietly groans and winces while he stretches his shoulders this way and that, working the knot out of the tie and hanging it back in the closet, recoiling the ropes and putting away the box, and rehanging his belt. He shakes the feeling back into his hands before rubbing his wrists, pacing the room and not looking at me.

He does this for a long time. Like those tigers in little cages at the zoo. But finally he stops by the dresser again and collects the empty glass of blood and the emptied blood bags. He rinses them before throwing them in the trash and washes out the glass and puts the wet towels into a different hamper than his clothes.

In seconds, everything is neat and tidy again, as if nothing happened.

"I used your toothbrush," I finally say.

"No problem," he answers before brushing his own teeth with it.

"I always assumed you slept naked," I say when he's done spitting and rinsing.

"I usually do."

He stays in the bathroom for a while, turned away from me so I can't see his face or his ass because of the pants. He stretches his shoulders and his neck and his back. I watch the way his muscles move and flex, the lovely curve of his spine. Finally, he turns off the overhead lights and returns to the bed, carefully smoothing the sheets and fluffing and replacing all the pillows. He lays down and holds open the covers for me.

"You coming?" he asks.

I nod and crawl into bed. He moves to the far side, away from from me, and flips off the lamp and sighs as the darkness settles around us. I can hear Stefan downstairs, scraping the ashes out of the hearth and into the metal pail. The kitchen door opens, probably while he puts them outside, and there's water running in the sink, maybe he's washing glasses or his hands. I assume those are usually Damon's chores before bed, tidying everything, that Stefan's doing it for Damon because Stefan doesn't cares if the ashes stay in the fireplace. And then his footsteps come up the stairs and head in the opposite direction, towards his room in the other wing of the house. Within moments, his shower comes on.

"Damon?" I whisper into the dark.

"What?"

He should snap or sound angry or sad or impatient. But his voice is just soft and even. Like I didn't just leave him tied to his bed for so long he had to hide himself and pace around his own room like a trapped animal. He sounds like he'd stay awake all night, even though I know he's tired and probably sore, waiting for me to ask my question.

"Do you remember how you held me at night when Stefan was gone?"

"Yes."

"We never talked about it. In the morning, we pretended like it didn't happened."

He doesn't answer.

"It mattered to me," I whisper because I don't want to lie anymore.

"I know," he finally says, like he understands all the other truths I want to say but don't know how.

"Do your arms hurt?" I ask.

"I'll live," he says.

"Will you hold me?" I whisper. I want to know what it feels like when he's touching me without my feelings getting in the way. Just feel him without feelings because I want to feel him, all of him, just him and his bed and his sheets and his skin against mine in the dark. I want to feel him and nothing else. "Just until I fall asleep?"

He doesn't say anything, just scoots over and spoons me against his chest like he used to. He wraps his arms around me. His breath is warm and moist on my neck and smells like mint from the toothpaste.

"Goodnight, Damon," I say.

Softly, so softly I barely feel it, he kisses my hair.

* * *

_A/N: Thanks, gentle readers, for hanging in there and feeling feelings with me. Thank you for sharing your feelings too, since it's always nice to know what people think. __Special thanks to all the guest reviews I can't respond to personally. And in case I haven't made it clear, CreepingMuse is awesomeness incarnate. You should go read her stories._


	20. Bombshell - Part Four

_A/N: Yeah, I'm still feeling feelings, so I wrote an expanded Caroline POV from "Stand By Me," graciously betaed, as always, but the extraordinary CreepingMuse._

* * *

**Bombshell - Part Four**

I get a lot of crap because sometimes I channel Scarlett O'Hara, but it's not because I have a Southern-Belle fetish or long for the good ol' days when the people we owned did all the work for us because the Forbes' glory days weren't like the Salvatores or the Fells or the Lockwoods. Forbes work. I identify with Scarlett because yes, she's mean sometimes, but when everyone else is laying around Tara and crying about how hungry they are, Scarlett's out in the field ruining her hands to pick cotton and feeding her family and doing what has to be done to save the home she loves. I admire that determination, that need to do something right and do it yourself, even if everyone ends up mad at you for it doing it and thinks you're insensitive. The Forbes are Founders, a dynasty of sheriffs who've covered up and concealed and kept as many people safely in the dark as possible, but like the Gilberts, we've always lived in town and by necessity have to do more than manage family trust funds.

I need something to do, but there's nothing I can do right now because I've done everything I can do, and now I'm just here, alone at the house because my mom has to work tonight because there's a fire and Jeremy's dead and it's safer for everyone else if they don't know the truth and Forbes are really good at rolling up their sleeves and getting the job done. And it's okay really because I don't think I could make my mom understand why this hurts so much without hurting her because she and I are all we have left, and I can't tell her it feels like my brother died and my childhood home is gone because she would just think I was blaming her for always working so much.

I want Tyler here so we can have sex so I don't have to think, or Matt so we can tell stories that make us both laugh and cry, or Stefan quietly brooding on the couch because then I could drink because I promised myself I wouldn't drink alone because that seems like the start of a really bad idea, and now I really wish I hadn't made that vow. Lord, I would prefer Klaus' company to being alone even though he just tried to kill me and very nearly succeeded and he's the reason Tyler left. But yes, even Klaus is better than the lonely sound of my pacing because I never know what he's going to say but there's a good chance I'm going to laugh or feel beautiful.

I wasn't on the island because someone had to stay behind and babysit Klaus even though he was trapped in the living room, and since that wasn't so hard I took it upon myself to get the vervain out of the water supply. We need to hydrate without searing our throats. I couldn't compel anyone into telling me how Bonnie's dad did it, and crawling around disgusting, wet, dripping pipes with a flashlight in my teeth isn't my idea of fun. But it had to be done, and now we can shower and scrub the floor and wash our hands without hurting, and that is not a small thing. We need to be able to clean. We need to be able to compel people sometimes. And of course I had to stay behind in case I needed to be the Blond Distraction to manipulate Klaus. If I ever start a band, and maybe I will one of these days because I have time to learn to play an instrument and I like to sing, that's what I'm calling it.

Yes, I am aware that I'm pretty and charming and boys like me, and I've done my share of bed-hopping this past year. But dammit, I wish they'd stop dangling me in front of the 1,000-year old Original we can't actually kill because then we all die too. Klaus, on his best day, is just this side of sociopathic, and we all know he likes me, maybe it's more than like, I don't know. But it's cheap, and it makes me feel even cheaper, and I am many things, but whore isn't one of them. And mostly I'm sick of being used like that because there's something about him. I can't quite shake it, and I need to not think about that right now. I will take my cue from Scarlett and think about that tomorrow.

Except all I can think about is Elena, and I want to do something because I've been mad at her, so incredibly mad at her because love is such a small word, and it means so many different things, and I love my friend who I've known and loved since before I can even remember, but I've hated her too, even as I love her, because Elena is impossible not to love, but she's also impossible to not hate. Perfect, loveable Elena's always been everyone's favorite, who doesn't do things like fall apart into hysterics when maybe she probably should, like when her parents died. That whole summer, she kept politely smiling and saying she was fine because she didn't want anyone to worry about her. She didn't want to make the rest of us feel guilty for having alive parents or sad for her because that's what Elena does. That's why she's both loveable and hateable because she makes it so easy to forget that the more Elena insists how fine everything is, the more fine everything seems, the more horrible it actually is, and it seems like the only word she's said since she's turned is fine. I should've been a better friend and seen this coming.

But like that summer, I've been selfish. After Dr. and Mrs. Gilbert died and Elena was released from the hospital the day before the funeral, and before that I didn't even know you could have a funeral for more than one person at a time, and instead of thinking about those two caskets covered in flowers at the front of the church and the two gaping holes in the dirt, I made casseroles and coffee and wanted to help, except there wasn't anything I could do but stand in the way and fill the terrible silence with words no one wanted to hear.

Jeremy was high and always wore headphones and I had to shout for him to hear me, and he'd sigh and slip them off, tinny music escaping. Only once he was listening I'd realize I had nothing to say to the boy I used to pretend was my little brother too because being an only child isn't all it's cracked up to be. So I'd babble or ask how he was doing, and most of the time he didn't even answer, just rolled his eyes and put the headphones back on. And I was mad at him, dammit, even though he was just a kid who was hurting because I was trying and he was making it impossible, and I can't believe he'll never roll his eyes ever again.

Elena should have fallen apart when her parents died because all of us needed to, but she didn't, so we didn't either, and in the end we just pretended like it wasn't that awful even though it was. Up until then, we were always at Elena's house, me and Matt and Bonnie, because why wouldn't we want to be part of that family? I lived for sleepovers at Elena's, and I was lucky to be Elena's friend because her house wasn't like my house where we sat around the table in silence so loud I could hear it humming. Or Bonnie's house because her dad was always away working and Grams scared us with her bottle of sambuca in the freezer and stories of burning witches. Matt's mom was usually off doing things we pretended we didn't know she was doing, and sometimes Vicki tried, but usually she didn't, and over there it was musty and dark and dinner meant cold cereal in front of the TV.

Until she turned, everything was always easy for Elena. She's doesn't have to try to be pretty and everyone wants to be her friend and she never had to study to make the best grades and her stories won the prizes and got read aloud in front of the school and she was always picked to be Mary in the Christmas pageant at church. I don't blame her for these things. I really don't. But it's hard being her friend sometimes, knowing everyone likes her better and she's always going to beat me, especially because she's so sweet and thoughtful and cares so much and doesn't ever want to upset anyone, and that makes being mad at her for being perfect just that much harder.

The one time I won something fair and square was Miss Mystic Falls, and even that's not really fair because she collapsed in on herself after her parents died, and instead of being there for her, I nodded my head when she said she was fine, and then I stopped asking. I just picked up what she dropped when she was quiet and didn't leave the house and only ever said how fine she was but no, she didn't want to see a movie or go to the Grille or shopping or cheerleader camp, and I ran with it so everyone could see how wonderful and organized and diligent I was, and I felt like a terrible person but part of me was really happy that summer because I didn't have to share the attention with Elena.

And she was so happy for me, truly happy when I won Miss Mystic Falls, even though Mrs. Gilbert would've been so sad that she'd lost and I don't see how Elena wasn't thinking that. When they put the tiara I'd dreamed about on my head and Elena hugged me, my first thought was that if it'd been me hugging her after she'd won, I wouldn't have meant it, but Elena really did.

Because Elena does care about people. She cares about people so much that sometimes it's scary because I've known her my entire life, but at the same time I don't really know Elena at all. Whoever she is, whoever Elena truly is and what Elena thinks and how Elena feels and what Elena wants doesn't matter to her. She keeps those parts of herself buried somewhere underneath all the feelings she has for other people.

I think that's why becoming a vampire was so much harder for her than it was for me, and I was turned to send a message, which is a really terrible reason. At least Stefan and Damon were turned out of love. Twisted and creepy love, sure, but love. And Elena turned because Dr. Fell was trying to help and Rebekah was trying to protect her family. Me? I was turned so I could pass a note in immortal study hall. And I've been so angry with her for making it so much harder than it needs to be. Everyone loves her and everyone was there to help her, and Elena just got lost somewhere inside herself where no one could find her, not even her, and it made me mad because dammit, the rest of us manage to get along even though none of us are human anymore except Matt.

But Klaus was right when he said I wouldn't take it back. I wouldn't. I like being me exactly the way I am because being me now is actually easier than it used to be because I'm more me than I was then. It's weird and confusing, but before, when I was human Caroline Forbes, all I felt was a need to be as loveable as Elena. Mostly, because I wasn't, I just felt like a failure. Turning into a vampire made me realize who I am, and I like being this Caroline and not competing with anyone else, and it doesn't make any sense but it's actually easier to be kind now that I have to remember to not hug too hard and need to eat people to stay alive.

I tried to explain that to her when she first turned, that she was still Elena, that she was more Elena now than she used to be. I told her she was the Extreme Elena, and I thought I was being helpful and comforting, only now I understand what a terrible thing that was to say because Elena doesn't know who Elena is. And what does it mean that Damon turned off the part of her that cares for other people, the only part I know or recognize, the only part she lets people see?

I don't blame Damon. Well, I do blame him because I always blame Damon. I acknowledge that he's done some really nice things for me, like risked his life and saved me more than once, and maybe it's unfair for me to not accept Damon's Damon-like way of apologizing without actually apologizing because he doesn't ever say he's sorry for anything, at least not that I know of. I've forgiven Stefan and then some for far worse things than Damon's done, but Stefan is different. He truly is sorry and tries to be a good person, and even when he fails, it's the trying that counts. Sometimes I think I should be a bigger person and allow Damon's actions to wipe his slate clean, except I know he's not done any of it for me. Not a single one of those really nice things was to show me that he cares because Damon doesn't care about me. He cares about exactly two people in this world, and I'm not either one. He's done heroic things for me because I matter to those two people, not to him. It's a technicality, I know, but it matters. And I'm grateful Elena and Stefan are such good friends to me that their love makes Damon want to protect me too because he's good to have at your back during a fight, and I'm not even sure I want to be included for my own sake in his tiny circle of people he cares about because Damon's kind of love is terrifying, so it's just as well that he only cares for me by association.

So I'm not blaming Damon, and I'm not judging Elena for cracking up today. Yes, I judge, often and without apology, but I'm not judging her this time because it's been a really long time coming. And I don't blame her, not at all, for wanting to pretend like she didn't smell it and hoping that Bonnie knew something that could magically undo all that had gone so completely and terribly wrong. Our plans always fall apart, and we've always managed before, so of course she expected this time would be like all the other times and we'd find a way out because that's what we've always done. We all wanted to believe that. We were all holding on to the fragile hope that was Bonnie. I was too because I want Jeremy back. For Elena and for Bonnie and for Matt and for Tyler, but selfishly, I want him back for me. Because I watched him grow up and used to pretend he was my little brother. I don't want him to be gone. But I'm glad Elena had enough sense to see that Bonnie's insane plan to resurrect every single supernatural creature since forever was technically an option but not really. Everyone would be back: Kol and Finn and Sage and Ester and Mikeal and Mason and all the tomb vampires. Would Mr. Saltzman be our teacher or would he be the vampire hunter who used pencils to stake me to the desk? All the people we've plotted to kill would be back, and everything that's happened trying to kill those people would have been for nothing, and I don't think my dad would be back because he wasn't ever a vampire, not even for a second, but if he did he would hate it.

We can't. We just can't. And if we did, let's just say for a second that Bonnie drops this veil she kept going on and on about. Does that mean it'll never go back up? That all supernatural creatures will be immortal forever? Why Bonnie seems to think our concern about raising all the evil dead is a lack of faith in her ability and not the fact that just because something can be done doesn't be it should be is a whole other thing I need to think about tomorrow.

I'm going to start a list of all the things I can't think about right now and need to think about tomorrow because there are so many of them, and I don't want to forget anything. Lists are good and helpful and organization is always key, and we're cracking up. We can't all lose our minds at the same time, and that's what we're doing right now. Bonnie, who's brainwashed or drugged or just plain crazy. Stefan, who actually wanted Damon to use the sire-bond on Elena. My mom, who asked me to compel all the firemen to wait until the house was beyond saving and the body was burned before they started putting it out. The rubble that was Jeremy's funeral pyre wasn't big enough to be a whole house where I wanted to pretend I lived, and it was still smoldering when I looked the fire marshall in the eye and said it was an accident, a terrible accident. Faulty wiring is the same excuse they used for the tomb vampire fire in town, but I couldn't think of anything else to say and my mom wasn't offering suggestions and I just froze and said wiring and now that I think about it that was a really stupid excuse. And Matt, poor Matt, who was sitting in his parked truck and sobbing when I left my mom at the scene to check on him because he lost both his best friends on the same day. He's the last human, and I wish there was something we could do to keep him safe and innocent and maybe Elena will let him wear Jeremy's ring even though I don't think Matt would. He was making so much noise, such ugly, angry grief, that I heard it long before I got there, and I wanted to do something. Gosh, I wanted to have something I could offer him.

That's why I make lists and casseroles and plan funerals and arrange flowers and clean floors and make sure everyone has a drink even if it's only something to hold in their hands because what they really want to hold is gone. Because it's something. And something is just that: something, anything that's better than nothing to make the unthinkable just a tiny bit more bearable. But there's nothing left to clean because Elena burned down the house and there are no casseroles because no one needs to eat anymore and Bonnie's lost her mind and could magic herself to death like Professor Shane's wife did and Tyler's gone and Klaus wants to kill him and Stefan is mourning Elena but he's also grieving for the boy she fell for on the first day of school and he can't ever be that boy again because there's only one cure and Katherine has it now and Silas is awake and we don't even know what that means and maybe Bonnie's crazy enough to bring about the end of the world and Damon turned off Elena and now my best friend is going to be someone I've never even met and I don't know what I'm supposed to do because I can't just pace and whine and cry because there has to be some way some small way I can make this day not so terrible but I can't think of what that small thing could possibly be and I need to do something anything besides pacing this empty house.

Oh crap.

I'm cracking up too because we need Elena like I never thought we did. Just like everyone always underestimates me, I underestimated her because I was so busy wanting to be her that I didn't see we need her to care about us more than she cares about anything, even herself. Being around Elena gives us a reason to be the better versions of ourselves. Without even trying, she makes you want to do the right thing. And now Elena's gone, and I don't know what we're going to do without her.

I watched it happen. I stood there and didn't understand what was happening until she doused the house with lighter fluid and poured the last of Mr. Saltzman's bourbon onto Jeremy's body, and when she struck that match I thought, "This is it. We're all just going to stand here together and burn." Only Damon caught that first match.

And when she fell to the floor I understood she wasn't just sobbing for Jeremy because it's not just Jeremy. We've all lost people. None of us has made it through these past two years without burying people we love. But Elena hasn't just lost them. She's felt our pain with us the way other people can't. She's felt our pain with us the way she shouldn't but somehow does because she's Elena. She's not just made lists and casseroles, even though she's done those things too. She's been silently helping us carry our grief, even when we didn't realize that's what she was doing. She's watched, one by one, as all those people who are gone now stood between her and death and took the blow instead of her. She made that sound, that terrible sound from the depths of her soul, because all she knows and all she is is caring for other people, and of all the people she loves, and I think Elena even loves people she hasn't even met, she loves Jeremy the most, and not only is he gone, but he died for her. That is the most horrible of truths.

I wanted to do something. I wanted to fix something, even something small, but there wasn't anything I could do. I've never felt so small and so afraid and so helpless. All I could do when my best friend shattered into a million pieces was stand there and watch and cover my ears because I couldn't bear the sound and I tried not to smell Jeremy and the lighter fluid. I didn't judge her for falling apart because even in that moment when she was making that sound and needed to burn down the house because it's her fault, it really isn't. She never asks people to stand between her and death. She would never ask that of anyone. They just do, and that's its own kind of pain I can only imagine because no one has ever done it for me, and I hope they never do.

I silently agreed with Stefan when he begged Damon to help her even though I hate Damon and I hate that Elena loves him because her loving him feels like a betrayal but yes. Please. Anything to make that sound stop. Stefan and I were useless. Only Damon could help.

When Damon fell to his knees before her, I nodded in agreement when he said he wanted to help her and please let him help her. I thought and hoped and prayed she would hear him or hear me because I was silently screaming with all my might, "Please, Elena. Honey. Please. Please let him help." Damon loves her so much, and he was breaking even more than the rest of us because he needs her even more, and I don't know why I never realized how much he loves her until that moment.

I saw it when he stroked her hair and put his hand on her cheek, and I covered my mouth to keep from shouting out because I knew what was coming. He wasn't touching her to comfort her because there's no way she felt his hands or the glass cutting her or the lighter fluid soaking into her jeans. But I felt it when Damon's heart broke as he silently said goodbye to the Elena who loves him.

When he told her he wanted her to turn it off, Damon held up his hand, but Stefan wasn't going to stop, wasn't going to let Damon do what needed to be done. So I took Stefan's hand in mine because I'm selfish and needed him. I needed to feel his hand in mine even though I don't think he realized I was even there. But someone had to hold him back because Damon was right. Dammit, I hate it but what else could he have done? He couldn't trap Elena in a cloud of mind control or tell her not to cry because it was upsetting the rest of us or order her to stop falling apart because we need her to stay together. He could have. He could have used the sire-bond to make her act any way he wanted her to regardless of how she felt. But Damon didn't. And it beautiful and awful and there was nothing I could do except hold Stefan's hand and watch it happen.

The tears weren't even dry on her cheeks, and Elena was gone.

* * *

_A/N: If you'd like a bit of cheering up, head on over to Trogdor19's Tomorrow's Rose, which she kindly and generously wrote because I said I needed something not-sad. So she wrote a charming little story about Stefan's tattoo that plays into Chapter 9, Damon's story about flipping his switch. It's funny and sweet and smutty, and it made me laugh out loud._


	21. Whispers in the Dark - Part Five

_A/N: I'm almost certain this will be my final "Stand By Me" chapter. Never say never, but my feelings feel... better. This series of chapters started with Stefan, so it feels right to have it end with Stefan. No beta, so be sure to scold me (and only me) if you think it sucks. But I hope you like it. I hope my gush of feelings helped you feel your feelings. And now all we can do is wait to see what the actual TVD writers do when things start back up in a couple weeks._

* * *

**Whispers in the Dark - Part Five**

"What's wrong?" Caroline asks so quickly it takes a second for my ears to catch up to her words. "Stefan?"

"Nothing," I whisper.

Dammit, Elena's right. I lie.

"Everything," I say. "Are you okay?"

"Well, actually, no. Why do you ask?"

"I thought maybe you were expecting a call. You answered almost before it had a chance to ring."

"I left a bunch of messages for Tyler."

I sigh. "He wouldn't have taken his phone."

"I know. I just thought..." Her voice trails off. "What do you need?"

I don't tell her I've been holding my phone in my hand, trying to call her since I came back downstairs after my shower. I shouldn't ask anymore of her, not tonight. Like Elena, she's a girl. Just a girl who's lost as much as the rest of us.

"Stefan?" she prompts. "Is there something I can do to help?"

"I just," I begin, but I don't know what to say.

The sound of her breathing on the other end of the phone is more soothing than I deserve. She doesn't fill the quiet with nervous chatter like she used to, although I imagine she's biting her cheeks to keep from babbling right now. It's a new thing we're working on. She's helping me with the blood. I'm helping her feel comfortable with silence. It's a lousy trade-off, obviously, but I wanted to give her something, and that's what she asked for.

"Stefan, why are you whispering? Where are you?"

"I don't want to disturb them."

There's a pause. "They're together?" she finally asks.

"They're quiet in his room with the door closed."

I don't know if that means they're together or not.

"I promised Damon I'd stay awake downstairs tonight," I say. "Elena asked if I'm the guard."

"She's talking?" Caroline asks. "Because when I left, she wasn't talking."

Oh Caroline. Yes. Elena is definitely talking.

"I cleaned the fireplace and washed the glasses because Damon was tied up and he doesn't like the smell."

"Damon was tied up?" Caroline asks, alarm creeping into her voice. "You mean metaphorically, right? As in he was busy doing something else? Elena didn't actually tie him up, did she?"

I'm not sure but I think so. I don't think this new version of Elena bothers to lie. I wonder which knot he showed her. He showed me so many knots, all with their own little songs to help me remember them. But I should've been listening to make sure he was safe. Damon would've listened if she'd gone to my room instead of his. I was lost in my own head. She left the door open to punish me, only I wasn't paying attention and should have been.

"Stefan?"

"Yeah."

"Why on earth would you have a fire tonight?"

"Elena wanted one. She burned her clothes."

"Oh."

She burned everything. Absolutely everything.

"He's always taken better care of me than I do him," I finally say.

"Stefan, no." There's a long pause. "It was really nice of you to clean up. I'm sure he'll appreciate it in the morning."

"I took a shower."

"I did too," she says.

"But then I got dressed again because I didn't think I should be in sleep pants right now, just in case. I even put on socks and shoes."

She laughs, only it's not a happy sound. Not really. "I did the same thing. I threw my clothes in the washer when I walked in the door, I took a shower, and then I got redressed."

"I tried to read," I tell her.

I hold my book in the other hand, the one not holding the phone. It's the only thing I have left from my human life. I impulsively took it with me when I left Mystic Falls with Lexi, not realizing Damon would double-back and burn down the house to get rid of my evidence. Even then I knew what to save. Even when I was lost, I knew what was most valuable. It makes my chest ache to know she, like Damon, won't have a single thing to hold in her hands two hundred years from now.

I gently run my fingers along the worn edges of my book, feeling Damon's letters and his human love for me before Katherine came and everything changed.

"Stefan," Caroline finally asks. "Is this a sober-sponsor call?"

"I don't know," I whisper.

"Do you need me to come over?"

I don't answer because I want to say yes, but I can't.

"I don't mind," she says. "I could use some company myself."

"I don't want to disturb them," I say again.

"Stefan, listen to me."

I'm listening, Caroline. Except she doesn't say anything either.

"What are you doing?" I finally ask.

"Pacing."

"Pacing?"

"Yeah. I couldn't sit still, but I couldn't think of anything I could do. Mom's still working."

"She called me," I say.

"She told me."

"Thanks for all your help. I should've stuck around. It wasn't fair to leave all that to you."

"It's okay, Stefan."

"Not really," I say. "Damon could've seen to Elena without me for a little while. You take better care of me than I take care of you too." Before she can argue with me I add, "I need a drink." I get up from the sofa and head for the bar. "I know you said you didn't want to drink alone, but we're talking. That means you can have one too."

"You think?" she asks in a small voice.

"Definitely."

The air rushes out of her lungs. I hear her freezer door open, and I smile and imagine her pulling out a bottle of vodka.

"Still have any of that Chopin I brought over?"

"No," she admits. "I had to compel the guy at the liquor store. I felt like such a lush when I demanded the entire case."

I can't stop my smile.

"I would have brought you more," I say. "So you don't feel lushy."

There's a pause before she whispers, "I put it on Damon's tab."

I quietly laugh.

"Why the whole case?"

"So I can switch out the cold bottles in the freezer, of course," she says. "It's easier than having to stay in the kitchen and washing and chilling the shot glasses. Remember how annoying it was the night you brought all those different kinds to taste-teste? I keep thinking Mom's going to say something about six bottles of vodka in the freezer, but she doesn't."

There's the sound of both of us swallowing.

"How is she?" Caroline finally asks.

She humped the rug at my feet while matter-of-fact asking me why I killed Damon's compelled girlfriend. Her nipples almost but not quite brushed my chest when she asked me if being a monster turned me on. She called me a liar.

"Stefan?"

I pour another drink.

"Stefan, please talk to me."

"She's."

But I don't say anything else. I swallow the rest of my drink and listen while Caroline's freezer door opens and closes again, and then she swallows too.

"I never gave vodka much thought until our night of taste-testing," she says. "It was just something to mix with other things to get drunk. Sometimes I miss Swamp Juice, though."

"Do I want to know what Swamp Juice is?"

"Vodka and Mountain Dew."

"That's just wrong," I say.

"It's effective," she says. "I'll mix us up a big ol' bucket full one of these days. But I like how smooth Chopin is. I like how it has just a hint of sweet on the front end, and that nice but not too strong burn going down so I'm reminded that I'm drinking vodka but it's not like 'Oh My Vodka!' and then it doesn't leave a funny taste in my mouth. This was definitely the best one."

I smile again and listen while she opens the freezer to switch out the only slightly-warmed bottle.

"I've created a monster," I say. "But it is still vodka. Do I need to be your sober-sponsor?"

"Is Stefan Salvatore teasing me?" she asks. "I think we need to alert the media."

"I'm partly serious," I tell her. "It_ is_ vodka."

"Please. It's impossible to really get trashed now."

"Believe me when I say I've tried," I admit. "And it takes diligence."

"And a crap-ton of booze, I imagine." There's the sound of both of us swallowing again.

"Thanks for talking, Caroline," I say. "But I shouldn't keep you. I need to check on them anyway."

"Wait."

I wait. She doesn't say anything.

"Caroline?"

"I'll come with you," she says.

"What?"

"Bring your phone with you." There's another pause. "I don't want you to have to do that alone. I'll come with you."

I finish the rest of my drink.

"Stefan?"

"I don't want to disturb them."

"The fact that you've said that three times now is starting to freak me out."

"Damon's a really light sleeper," I say. "He should rest."

If he can.

"I'll be super quiet. I won't make a sound. I'll just breathe so you know I'm with you, and you can hold the phone really tightly against your ear."

I pour another drink and swallow it.

"Stefan?"

"Okay," I say.

"Okay."

I slip off my shoes and take a couple of deep breaths before flashing up the stairs as quietly as I can. I don't breathe as I stand perfectly still outside Damon's door. At first I can only hear Caroline's breathing, so I press the phone against my chest and close my eyes and listen. Really listen like I should have earlier.

They're obviously asleep. At first I can't distinguish the sound of their breaths, both slow and deep and even. But then Elena murmurs, and I hear the rustle of sheets, like she's moving in her sleep. The murmur turns into a whimper, and then I hear Damon. He doesn't have to move across the bed. He's right next to her when she cries out.

"Shhh," he soothes. "Elena."

"Damon."

The sheets move, like he's tucking her in, or maybe rearranging pillows, or wrapping his leg around hers. I can't tell.

"It was." She's speaking quietly, but she's breathing hard, too hard, like she's been running for her life. "There was a fire. At my dad's office. In the basement."

"It's just a dream," he whispers.

"No," she says. "It happened. I was there. You were there."

"Just a dream," he repeats.

"They were on the floor. Everyone. Bodies. Jeremy and my parents and Ric and Jenna and John and Isobel."

"Elena," he soothes. "Shhh."

"No. They were all there. Vicki and Anna and Kol and Finn and Sage and the mean hybrids who wanted to torture me and Tyler's Uncle Mason and his mom. Rose was there, too. And her friend Elijah killed in front of me. His head was next to him and not attached. And Bonnie's mom and Bonnie and Caroline and Stefan. Even me. I thought it was Katherine, but it was me. We were all there."

"It's okay."

"No," she insists again. "You were there too. Only you weren't dead like the rest of us. They were all dead, with open eyes that couldn't see. And it smelled. Oh. So much smell I could taste it. And there were flies buzzing. Lots of flies. It was noisy and distracting."

"Just a dream," he says again.

"Only you weren't dead. You were tied up on the floor. And I poured lighter fluid over everyone. All of us. Even me. Because I was dead too even though I was there with lighter fluid. But you weren't. You were the only one who wasn't dead, and you were so scared. Because I was a monster. And I lit the match and just walked away."

"Elena. Breathe."

"I can't."

"Okay. Here. Concentrate on this."

They're quiet for a long time while her breaths slow down.

"I like feeling your hair," she finally whispers. "It's softer than the sheets or your shirt or your tie."

"Yeah?"

"I never noticed before how soft your hair is."

And then I almost drop my phone.

Damon starts to sing.

Softly. So softly a human, even a human laying in bed next to him, probably wouldn't be able to hear him. He shouldn't be able to sing on pitch that softly, but he does. He's singing. Damon's singing to Elena, the same songs he used to sing to me when I had bad dreams at night and went running into his room after everyone else had gone to bed. He never got mad, and by the time I flung myself into his bed he was already holding back the covers for me because just the door opening was enough to wake him up.

There were nights I whispered to him about the dangers I knew were lurking in the shadows, but most of the time, I just wanted to be with him. Sometimes I went into his room even when I wasn't afraid because I liked to hear him sing, and that was the only time he ever did. Just for me, quietly and beautifully. He only sang in the dead of night when everyone else was asleep. He'd tuck me into his side and rest his chin on my head and sing the songs our mother sang to him.

Even though I can't see, hearing him singing makes me feel like an intruder. I'm witnessing something he wouldn't want me to know about. Just like his songs used to be only for me, tonight they're only for her.

I want to stand here and listen because it's been so long since I heard Damon sing. But I can't. As silently as I arrived, I make my way back down to the dark parlor.

My phone is still pressed against my chest, and I lay down on the sofa before moving it back to my ear.

"Stefan?" Caroline asks. "What happened."

I can't answer.

"Stefan, I can hear you breathing. I know you're there. If you don't answer me, I'll come over."

"She had a bad dream."

"What?"

"She was having a nightmare."

"I wouldn't think a switched-off vampire dreamed at all."

For decades, my nights were filled with vivid, terrible dreams awash in blood. Dripping in blood. Blood splashed and sprayed and smeared. Gushing jugulars pumping blood where a head should be. Blood that cried and begged. Dreams so real I'd be vamped out when I woke, tasting the blood on my tongue, the screams ringing in my ears.

I reveled in it when I was awake, but when I was asleep, it turned into a nightmare.

"Stefan?"

"He," I whisper.

He sang to her. He's singing to her right now. And she came back to him because she felt his hair.

Caroline doesn't fill the silence with chatter. She lets it be the sound of our breathing.

"He loves her," I finally say.

Caroline sighs. "I'm out of cold vodka."

"I know you and Damon," I begin.

"I know he loves her," she interrupts. "I know that."

"Even after."

"After what? What happened, Stefan?"

"She's."

"She's what?"

"She's different."

"Oh Stefan," she whispers, and she sounds lost and scared, and I am a selfish prick for burdening her.

"I shouldn't have said anything," I say.

"No. We should talk. It's good that we're talking."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah," she says. "I was thinking, right before you called, that I don't know who Elena is. I should because I've known her my entire life, but I don't. I don't think anyone does because all she ever does is think about other people and not herself. I'll have to meet her, I guess. Tomorrow. Because I don't know what Elena looks like when she doesn't care about people."

She looks naked and beautiful and terrifying. She looks honest and fierce and indifferent.

"She loves him," I finally manage to say.

"I couldn't hear you, Stefan."

"She loves him."

Caroline sighs. "Does she? And I mean not just in the general way that Elena loves everyone including strangers?"

"Yes."

I think maybe she always has. I think maybe it's always been Damon.

"Because I've worried about that. I really have. I know, they've been strangely simpatico from the beginning, but this sire-thingy is just creepy. But does it prove she really does love him? Or does she just think she does? You aren't sired to Katherine, so I don't understand. It's just..." Her voice trails off again.

I love that she uses both simpatico and thingy in the same sentence.

"You're worried for your friend because we're talking about Damon." I say for her.

"I didn't say that."

"You were thinking it."

She's quiet for a second before she whispers, "Would you hate me if I said I worry about my friend because she's in love with your brother, or maybe just thinks she's in love with him?"

"No. But in defense of my brother, he's not always showed you his best side."

"Can a person love when they're switched off? Is that even possible?"

"Damon loved Katherine," I say.

"What about you?"

"Yes," I whisper. "I've always loved."

"I don't mean to bring up the Ripper," she begins.

"No," I interrupt. "It's okay. We should be able to talk."

I listen to the soothing sound of Caroline's breathing, knowing I could never say this if she were sitting in front of me.

"Everyone always calls me the Ripper when I'm flipped, but I don't deserve a different name. I'm still me."

I swallow and listen to her breathing and take a deep breath because Elena said I always lie.

"I have a list of every person I've ever killed," I finally say.

She doesn't answer.

"It's on a wall in an apartment I keep in Chicago. I've never killed someone without first asking their name so I could write it down. It's a very long list that takes up most of the wall."

"Why are you telling me this?" Caroline whispers.

"Because even when I black out, even when I can't remember anything else because I've given myself to the blood and torn someone into pieces, I remember their names. Always."

I can hear her swallow.

"What I'm trying to say is that I'm always me. And Damon is always Damon. And Elena will always be Elena. And you, if you ever switch off, will still be Caroline. We can't escape ourselves."

She lets me breathe and decide what I want to say.

"Katherine once told me," I continue.

"Katherine?" Caroline scoffs. "As in the bitch who stole the cure out from under our noses?"

"Yes," I say. "But she's made some valid points."

Caroline huffs. "I suppose even broken clocks are right twice a day. What's Katherine's sage-like existential wisdom?"

"She told me a vampire's humanity was our greatest weakness because no matter how hard we try to turn it off, it keeps finding its way back. And she's right. It does."

Once more she doesn't speak, and I wish she was sitting here so I could see her face and know what she's thinking because Caroline can't lie. I love that about her. But I'm glad, too, because it would be too easy for me to lie if she were here, and she deserves this truth.

"I'm so sorry, Caroline," I finally say. "You should go to bed. I'm."

I swallow several times because Elena is right. I do lie. I want to tell Caroline I'm okay, but I'm really not. I'm raw and exposed and miserable. This might be the worst night of my life, which is really saying something, and I don't want to lie and say that it's not.

"You should get some sleep," I say instead. "All of this will be waiting for us to deal with tomorrow."

She quietly laughs. "You're a closet Southern-Belle."

"What?"

"Nothing," she says. "Just." There's a long silence. "Nothing," she finally repeats.

"Goodnight, Caroline."

"Stefan?"

"Yeah."

"Will you come to bed with me?"

I don't answer because I'm not sure what she's asking.

"I mean, I'm going to get into bed now, instead of sitting in the living room, and I know you have to stay downstairs because as much as I hate to admit it, Damon's probably right about that. You seem confident that she's still her, but you're rattled too even though you're not telling me why. What if she wakes up and decides she wants to eat someone, you know?"

She abruptly stops, as if she ran out of words.

"Want me to stay on the phone until you fall asleep?" I ask.

"Please," she whispers.

"Sure. To be honest, I could use the company too."

"Do you think I can risk changing into pjs? I don't like sleeping fully clothed."

I smile. "I think so."

"I'm going to put you down here on the bed for a minute."

"No problem."

I close my eyes and listen to the soft sounds of Caroline opening a drawer and the swishing of fabric. Then there's running water while she brushes her teeth.

"Okay," she finally says.

"Your mom come home?"

"No. She said she was probably going to sleep downtown. She has a nice couch in her office. Tomorrow will start early for her."

"That makes sense."

"Yeah. It used to make me mad that she works so much."

"But not anymore?" I ask.

"No," she whispers.

"Goodnight, Caroline," I say again.

"Goodnight, Stefan."

I listen to the rustle of her sheets as she settles into bed. She sighs and fluffs her pillow and sighs again. At first, she tosses and turns, but eventually, she stills. Her breathing steadies out. It's as soft and slow as Elena and Damon's. I lay stretched out on the sofa in the dark parlor, optimistic enough to leave my shoes off. I close my eyes even though I'm not going to sleep. I know I can't sleep. But I hope Damon is. I hope Elena's dreams are untroubled. I listen to Caroline long after she's drifted off, oddly content because there's nothing more we can do tonight. We whispered in the dark and waited for tomorrow together, and as hopeless as today has been, it feels good knowing I'm not alone.

* * *

_A/N: I didn't set out to plagiarize the Mumford and Sons' song title. I just liked knowing that Elena and Damon had each other to whisper to, and Stefan and Caroline weren't alone either. Everyone is, in fact, whispering in the dark. But the lyrics are freakishly perfect, and it's a lovely song, so you should consider heading over to youtube and listening to it. The live on Letterman version is awesome._


	22. Ghosts That We Knew

_A/N: For CreepingMuse because fulfilling her chapter requests is the least I can do in exchange for all her fantastical CreepingMuse-ness. This is an expanded Stefan POV from "The Birthday" (3.1), inspired by some flipped-Elena's questions and the Mumford and Sons song with the same title. Head on over to youtube and listen before you read, again with the Live on Letterman version 'cause it's almost unbearably beautiful. Stefan will wait for you..._

* * *

**Ghosts That We Knew**

"You're back," Klaus observes after he snaps Ray's neck so he lays dead and still on the pool table.

"Did you doubt me?" I ask.

"Not for a second," he says.

I did. I doubted me. Because of course Damon's hot on our heels. He knows the Ripper better than anyone, and he works fast. He spent years trailing me and cleaning up bodies, and this summer is no different. Burning and burying and getting rid of evidence.

Klaus is looking for werewolves, so they're rough people. Last night's farm house was an exception. We've been to a lot of trailer parks and rental houses with chipped paint that don't require invitations to enter. So many names to add to my wall. Names like Mitch and Gage and Bubba, who turned out to actually be Eugene. Worn women named Brittney and Courtney and Destiny and Cookie, who was really Anna Katherine. There was an Ava, too.

Regardless of the name, they almost always beg.

That moment at the end, right before I kill them, I really see who a person is because I don't compel them. To not run. To not be afraid. I need them to feel everything. Terror makes the heart pump harder. Sweetens the blood with adrenaline. Fear shows me who they really are on the inside before I look and see for myself.

Sometimes I have to compel their names because they're too scared to find words, and I need their names. More often than not, it's the hardened men with bruised knuckles who piss and shit themselves before I'm done. But every once in a while there's an Ava. A tiny woman barely more than a girl with spiky red hair and big hazel eyes that were just a bit too close together. She didn't scream. She told me her name with only the faintest tremor in her voice and looked at me until her eyes didn't see anymore.

I didn't have to ask Andie her name.

"I knew you'd pass the test," Klaus quietly says with a sad smile that leaves his dimples hidden, as they should be.

Klaus keeps looking at me like he knows a secret and is waiting for me to catch on. He stares at my lips, my ass, my hips. My tongue seems to remember what it feels like to trace those fucking cherubic dimples. It somehow knows the scratch of stubble along his jaw. But he hasn't asked that of me. He could. I promised him a decade of obedience. But Klaus is polite. He watches and smiles and waits. He licks his lips like the wolf he is.

I don't know why he's so interested, and I was afraid he wouldn't let me talk to Damon myself. Klaus can't return to Mystic Falls and realize she survived. But he let me go. With a smile and his gaze lingering on my ass when I walked out the door, past the compelled guard who won't let anyone else enter or leave the bar. I sped down the highway on a stolen motorcycle, the wind blowing the smell of Ray's blood and the wolfsbane from my clothes. I tasted the wind and tried but failed to keep my scotch buzz while I decided how best to tell Damon to stay away so he'll believe me.

Damon hears what I need to tell him, not what I want him to know. He always did. I hate the way he does that, hearing what I mean to say regardless of the words I use or my stony silences. But that's why he's following us and covering up my messes. Because he can hear me shouting even when I'm not saying anything at all.

But Damon has to walk away this time. I want him to. For her. I want him to listen to my words, not interpret my silence. He can't protect me because I need him to protect her.

Anyone else would have compelled her to not worry about me. He loves her. I know he does. It's the only reason I left her in his care. And Damon's never had to compel women to fall for him. She'd easily do it on her own if she wasn't intent on finding me. I know this. He knows this. Maybe deep down she knows it too. But he won't compel her to leave me behind. Not Damon.

But I can be the man she thinks I am. I can be the hero this time, but that means the Ripper needs to make a statement. A big, messy statement Damon can't interpret any other way than a piercing, "Fuck off, brother."

It's her birthday, so they'll be together. Crashing her party and tearing into someone she cares about in front of her would be the most effective. Not Jeremy because the ring would bring him back. Not Caroline because she's a vampire and would heal. Someone who'll stay dead. And I thought, for a few miles at least, feeding on Matt while she watched would be the statement that convinced both her and Damon I was beyond saving.

Matt's strong. An athlete. He trusts me, they all trust me, so the betrayal would add complexity to his fear. He'd fight before losing, and the Ripper loves it when they fight.

Except I couldn't.

I just couldn't. I wanted to, but she can't hate me.

So I chose Andie instead of Matt. She does the late night news and wouldn't be with the rest of them. She's Damon's compelled girlfriend, so he cares for her, obviously, because it's impossible to keep a human close otherwise. But he doesn't love Andie because he loves her. She doesn't love Andie, either. No one loves Andie, but I don't have to ask her name.

"You still care for your brother," Klaus says, like he's reading my mind. "Your old life."

I planned to feed on Andie at the studio and leave the pieces for Damon to find. I usually don't mean for there to be pieces. It just happens, and I don't remember how. But I wanted Andie in pieces. Those incredible legs of hers. Her lovely neck. And when I got there, I wanted to feed because she was so afraid. I smelled it. I heard it. She was so scared I could taste it on my tongue.

"No," I tell Klaus, walking towards the bar because I need a drink and I don't want him to see my face. I don't think I'm lying well. "I don't care about anything anymore."

"You put on a good show, Stefan." My name comes out of his mouth like a caress. "I almost believe you. Let's hope, for your brother's sake, he does."

I compelled Andie to get away from me before I could taste her. God, I wanted to taste her. She smelled so good. Just a sip. One tiny sip because she smelled terrified. But I don't sip. And I couldn't rip her into pieces. Not Andie. Not someone I know, someone Damon cares about enough to actively not kill. So I sent her up onto the catwalk, far away from me, to wait while I used her phone to text Damon.

"You never stop caring for family, do you?" Klaus quietly asks. He stands so close my neck tingles from his breath. His hand is warm as it rests easily on my hip like it belongs there. He squeezes the muscles there, his thumb lazy as it moves in soothing circles.

I held Damon against the wall and made him watch Andie fall to her death. Because that was better than seeing her after I'd fed. For once, Damon wasn't stronger. He couldn't stop me from holding him back. And while he flashed over to her body, I flashed outside, before the smell of her blood overtook me. I ran away before I made a bigger mess for him to clean up. Away from him. From Andie. From Mystic Falls and her street where I want to climb the tree and be waiting in her room and bury my face in her hair and cry. I need to know that she forgives me because that's what she does best. I need her to tell me that she loves me. That we're alright.

God, I need her. Damon, please don't take her from me.

"But every time you feed," Klaus reminds me. "The blood makes it easier to let go." He gently runs his fingers through my hair. "Let go, Stefan," he croons. "Just let go."

I shake my head. "I can't."

"Shh," he soothes, his hand still moving softly through my hair. "You're making it so much harder than it has to be. You're killing yourself, Stefan."

I killed them. Not me. Them. Names. So many names. So much blood. They're dead. Ghosts that haunt my dreams, and now I have to write Andie's name on my wall. I haven't killed someone I know since the very beginning.

Andie's a ghost I knew.

Andie's dead because I killed her. And my message to Damon got lost because without her in pieces he heard what I needed to say but couldn't instead of what I did say, which was to leave me alone. Andie's dead, and he heard me. Damon's not going to leave me alone because he knows I don't want him to.

Andie's someone I knew, and at least she's not in pieces, but now Andie's just a name.

Damon. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.

"Stefan," Klaus whispers, his lips so close they're brushing against my ear. "I want to help you."

Yes. Please. Help. I need help.

"I know what will make this all go away."

I shake my head because I know what he's going to say, and it will help, but only for what feels like a second. I need more than a second of peace.

He squeezes my hip again, leans against me in a way that feels strangely familiar.

"No witnesses, Stefan," he whispers. "Take your time. Forget everything else. Just the blood."

Tim. Red, the bartender. Claudine. Mike. Ashley. Jax, short for Jackson. Summer. Pierce. Tucker. Brandon. Big D, who's really Daniel. Alex. Taryn. Gunner. Jim. Max. Peaches, not a nickname because someone actually named their daughter that. Steve. Rob. Jake. Butch, whose real name is Clarence. Sawyer. Jennifer. Will.

The guy at the door is last: Reese.

I don't know how long it took. It could have been seconds. Or maybe hours. Their blood is dripping from my chin and wet on my hands, but I don't remember anything but the names. There are pieces strewn across the bar like a bomb went off in a mannequin factory.

They were people. Now they're pieces. Names for my wall. Ghosts who will haunt my dreams and make me remember even though I can't right now and don't ever want to.

Klaus watches, a contented smile on his face, as I wash the blood from my hands and face.

"Fancy cleaning up, mate?" he asks. "Or should we just let them be?"

I don't answer, and he doesn't stop me when I stumble outside. I lift my face to the night sky and breathe. I don't deserve her. Her love or her faith in the person I want to be. I don't deserve to even say her name. But I need her.

God, I need her.

Elena.

I pull my phone from my pocket. I need to hear her voice. She won't answer because it's late. Her phone won't be turned on. I'll just let her voicemail pick up and listen to her recorded voice and remember why I have to make this hard. Why I can't flip my switch and let myself get lost. Why I get only these terrible seconds of peace before the names haunt me.

They should haunt me. So many names. Ghosts. I need them to haunt me even though closing my eyes at night terrifies me because my dreams are filled with them. Pieces of ghosts screaming their names while I lick their blood from my lips.

"Hello?"

God. She answered. Elena answered. It's not a recording. It's her.

"Hello?" she asks again.

Elena.

"Stefan?" she whispers.

Yes.

Elena's like Damon, and she can hear me in the silence.

Elena, I'm lost. I'm so lost.

"Stefan, if this is you, you'll be okay."

I nod because if she says it, it must be true. Elena wouldn't leave me alone and lost in the dark. She said it's okay. That I'm okay.

I'm alright.

"I love you, Stefan."

I love you too. So much. More than you know. More than I deserve. I love you, Elena.

"Hold onto that."

Yes. God, yes. I can. For you. You're my hope. My heart.

"Never let that go."

Never. I can't let go. I can't make it easy and get lost this time. Damon will find me, Elena will be my light, and I will be saved from all the ghosts that haunt me.

* * *

_A/N: I'm sure it's obvious, but in my head-canon, Klaus and Stefan had a thing in the '20s that Stefan doesn't remember yet because Klaus hasn't broken his compulsion. I wrote them in a one-shot, Guilty Pleasure. _


	23. Little Lions

_A/N: Expanded Ric POV from "Let the Right One In" (1.17), or the formation of Team Badass. Beta and title compliments of the ever-insightful CreepingMuse (and Mumford and Sons, of course). She suggested "Little Lion Man" is Damon's theme song, but I take it a step further and put forth the theory that it's really Team Badass's song. _

* * *

**Little Lions**

The girl tending bar smiles when she sees me walk in, and by the time I'm sitting at what's become my favorite stool, the bourbon is already waiting for me. I'll get charged for a single, but what's filled to the brim in the chilled glass with only a couple of ice cubes, just the way I like it, could conservatively be described as a generous double.

"Mr. Saltzman," she says with a nod, going back to her clipboard and the week's order.

Like all the people behind the bar at the Grille, she knows I don't like idle conversation. She'll keep a close eye on my drink, making sure I don't wait for refills, but she won't press for details about my day or gossip or fill the silence with chatter. She wouldn't raise an eyebrow if I had my school satchel and pulled out papers to grade while I drank, and when people wander in, she'll subtly suggest they sit away from me.

It's strange, Mystic Falls, and not just because it's crawling with vampires. I wasn't expecting it to feel like home, to have the carefully guarded community accept me as quickly as they have. I'm used to being on the fringes, an outsider peering through the glass. But there's something about this place that tells me Isobel was right. It's not evil exactly, but there's an energy about this sleepy little town that makes it hum. It doesn't seem at all insane to call it magic because in a matter of weeks, Mystic Falls has given me everything I've spent my life looking for: a favorite stool at a bar where I don't have to order, a job I actually enjoy, a girlfriend who's open and warm and bubbly, a couple of neat kids I've quickly come to care about, the truth about what happened to Isobel, and the identity of the vampire I've wanted to kill for the past two years.

When Isobel disappeared, I couldn't tell the police what I saw. They would've thought I was crazy if I told them it was a vampire. I couldn't describe the creature who looked like a young man but wasn't, whose fangs dripped with my wife's blood. I couldn't tell them how he sighed with contentment and held Isobel almost lovingly against his chest as he drank deeply from her neck before flashing off with only the sound of the wind moving. I couldn't tell anyone I saw a vampire sucking the life from my wife.

But to be honest, there weren't many people around to tell at that point. In the years since Isobel and I got together, they'd all drifted away, and I didn't care. When I met Isobel, she was all I wanted. That first year, when we lived on ramen noodles and stolen booze, I couldn't get enough of her. I didn't want to go out with anyone else, and eventually my friends stopped calling to ask. I was content to have her all to myself on our mattress on the floor.

The only real furniture we owned back then was the huge oak table we used as a desk, and I didn't mind when she gradually took over my side, pushing me and my work away. She typed so fast that the individual sound of the keystrokes bled together, and when she made that noise, I knew I was completely alone. So I crawled between her legs while she worked. I listened as the steady click of the computer keys faltered, used that as my guide, drawing her out, teasing her. I distracted her from the work in front of her and kept her with me as long as I could with my fingers and my tongue. I stumbled to class smelling of sex, the taste of her still glossy on my lips.

I didn't meet her parents until they called me a year after she disappeared, asking me to come to a memorial. I didn't know what to expect because the few colleagues Isobel considered friends weren't invited, and they couldn't tell me anything about Isobel's family or her life before Duke. Isobel never answered my questions either. All I knew was that she grew up not far from a mysterious little town called Mystic Falls. It was as if she magically sprung from the ground at the age of 18.

I swallow the rest of my drink, and the girl has a fresh one ready for me when I put the empty glass back on the bar.

"Sure I can't get you something from the kitchen?" she asks with a smile.

Eating would probably be a really good idea. I drink too many dinners.

"No thanks," I say.

I wasn't drunk when I went to Isobel's memorial, but I wished I had been. It was just the three of us and a casket full of who knows what at a cemetery in Virginia. Not far from here, actually. Her parents were polite. Isobel's mother placed a soft hand on my cheek when I introduced myself. But they didn't have any answers for me because they didn't know my wife, the woman I loved. They lamented that they'd lost their version of Isobel long ago. They didn't seem either disappointed or surprised when I declined lunch with them, said I had things I needed to do back on campus.

They didn't know about her work, and I didn't tell them I was tracking the vampire who killed her. I didn't tell anyone I was designing weapons to use against them based on what I remembered of her notes and late-night theories. My only plan was to find that sonofabitch and kill him, and if I died in the process, well, that'd be all right too. I quit my job, drank too much, and lived off the pity check Isobel's department head sent me. I did that until the money was gone, and then I moved here and took the job at the high school no one else seemed to want because why not?

And I did, in fact, find him. Damon Salvatore. The vampire I saw draining my wife. Only he doesn't look demonic most of the time, with fangs and red eyes with blackened veins crawling down his cheeks. He looks like a young man with fashionably messy hair and freakishly blue eyes who wears an expensive leather jacket regardless of the weather and drives a vintage Camaro. As it turns out, the asshole's actually pretty cool.

After all that time searching for vampires, for him, I just looked up one day and there he was, sitting on the stool next to me because he happens to like drinking at the same bar I do. We even like the same drink. He prefers his neat, but it's a minor distinction.

I swallow the last of my bourbon. Once again, before I can set the empty glass back on the bar, the bartender pulls out a fresh glass from the freezer, puts exactly two ice cubes in it, and fills it to the brim with bourbon.

"Thanks," I say.

She nods. "Sure thing, Mr. Saltzman."

The bourbon is perfectly cold and hot at the same time, and it goes down smoothly. A little too smoothly, if I'm honest with myself.

That night at his house, Damon told me there was something special about Isobel, as if I didn't already know that. He said it like I didn't know my own wife. He told me he liked the fire in her eyes, which was why he turned her instead of killing her.

I believe him because that fire is what I loved best too. It's the only resemblance I can find between her and Elena, that fire in the eyes. What are the odds that my new girlfriend's niece and the adopted sister of the student I took under my wing because he reminds me of myself at that age turns out to be the daughter I didn't know Isobel even had?

Jesus. That snarly facet of my new reality is precisely why I don't intend to stop drinking anytime soon. It's why I found the loft across the street from the Grille, so I don't have to worry about driving home and killing someone. Because nothing in this world is free, a lesson I learned the hard way when I was too young: Jenna, Jeremy, Elena, the truth about Isobel, this bar stool and the chilled glasses of bourbon the just-friendly-enough bartenders keep pouring. These things I wanted so desperately, a home and a family and a place where people know me and my life has meaning, they come at a price. I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop, only it's not just the two that fall to the floor. There is, as it turns out, an endless supply of shoes, and they're more like steel-toed work boots, thuds resonating on hard-wood floors like bombshells.

I swallow again, wincing when I realize how quickly I'm going through the drinks.

Damon said he slept with her. My wife. My Isobel. He said he fucked her like of course he did, and I was incredibly stupid to imagine he hadn't. Did he know that she liked to be caught unaware? If she's the one who sought him out, did he realize she liked to be stalked? Hunted? Did he know she lived for the moment when I'd catch her, pin her down, that moment when she knew she was overpowered? Of course, that's when she liked to take charge, and I always let her. I let her get away, turn the tables, take me as forcibly as she wanted. I let her pretend that she was stronger, that she'd got the best of me.

I went to Damon's house to kill him because he'd killed her, which was as drunkenly stupid as he accused. I left Jenna and her warm kindness, her soft eyes and softer mouth, where it would be so easy to get comfortable and forget about answers and revenge. I slipped in through the unlocked kitchen door and found Damon drinking before a roaring fire in a room full of expensive antiques and books.

Isobel would've loved that room, all the history Damon had lived through and seen and experienced. Did he bring her here, I wonder? Did he turn her and abandon her, or did he stick around for a while and show her how to live as a vampire? Did he fuck my wife before or after he turned her into a vampire?

"Hey, Mr. Saltzman!"

"Mr. Saltzman."

Two of my students walk in and give me fist bumps while they order cokes. They wander over to the pool table, and the soft cracking of the balls hitting each other adds to the soothing background noise of the Grille.

It's like Damon read my mind that night at his house. All the doubts I had, the questions I asked her, and then I asked myself after she was gone, the words dropped so casually from his lips: I didn't make her happy; I wasn't enough for her; she was biding her time with me until she found him and got what she really wanted.

Damon Salvatore said we were kindred spirits, he and I, not something I thought the vampire who killed my wife would say. And certainly not with such sadness as he stabbed me with my own stake. He meant it when he said he was going to sit and watch me die. Damon didn't even blink while I laid on his expensive rug and tried but failed to breathe because he had, in fact, punctured my lung. The last thing I saw was a look of pity in those blue eyes, although I don't know whether it was for me or him, or maybe a little of both.

Only I came back, thanks to the ring Isobel said would protect me from the things that go bump in the night. When she gave it to me, I didn't believe her. I teased her because it was gaudy and hideous, but I put it on because it seemed to make her happy. And when she vanished a couple nights later, I was never going to take it off because it was the last thing she gave me. I didn't realize it was really magic until I woke up on the rug where I died, and Damon was gone.

Stefan was there, and after he realized I was all right, back from the dead but not a vampire, he demanded to know where Katherine was. He wasn't very forthcoming with the details, but I can put two and two together. She must be the vampire who turned them, the suck-ass unrequited love Damon spoke of, the vampire Elena looks like, which is somehow why she doesn't look like Isobel.

Stefan reminds me of Isobel, actually. He seems charming, and Elena obviously loves him. Other than his eyes, which are too old for his young face, he looks like any other student in my class, with his hoodies and his school bag. But there's something calculating about him. He has a way of speaking that makes it seem like he's confiding a great deal, but for all his words, he's not saying much of anything.

I knew Damon was lying when he said the woman in charge of the vampires holding Stefan hostage could help me find Isobel. And I couldn't even summon anger for the fact that he called me a coward because I am. I've been saying I just want answers for the past two years, but I don't know if I do. What can Isobel possibly say to me: "Sorry I made you think I died, but life with you was unbearable."?

But I wanted to help Elena because she's Isobel's daughter, and for a second, I recognized that fire in her eyes. They're darker than Isobel's, Elena's eyes, but she's about the same age as Isobel when I met her, and there was something in Elena's determined face that made me want to help. Because she loves Stefan, and she didn't care about the dangers, she was going to save him. And I admire that courage, no matter how young and stupid it is. And Damon was going to get his brother, and I admire that too. And maybe I wanted to prove to Damon that I may be a coward, but I'm not afraid of a fight.

That's how I ended up showing my stash of vampire weapons to the vampire I'd planned on using them against. And then I saw, first-hand, how quickly a vampire can snap a human neck. Damon was unapologetic for the woman who owned the house, the terrible crunch I could hear over the sound of the driving rain and the way her body dropped heavily to the porch. Dead. He said he didn't care about humans. But he wanted me to get out of the house as soon as I'd gotten him inside. He wanted me to stay away and stay safe.

Somehow, I'd gone from a person he killed without apology in his own living room to a person he was protecting, and as far as I know, there are just the two humans on that list. And like Elena, I didn't listen to him and stay away from the house full of vampires. I was ready to fight, maybe to my death, with the vampire I'd intended to kill at my side because I believe him when he says that Isobel found him and begged him to turn her. Isobel could be...

I swallow more of my drink.

Persuasive.

How well I know that. When Isobel turned that fire in her eyes on you, you felt like the only person in the world.

I've spent all this time hunting him. Blaming him for something that wasn't his fault.

That's all kinds of fucked up on just about every level of fucked up that exists.

I'm almost finished with my drink when Damon walks in. He sits at the stool next to me, and like me, the bartender doesn't wait for him to order, just pours and sets down his bourbon because he's a regular too. He takes a long swallow.

"That was fun," he says.

I glare at him but don't speak because it was the opposite of fun. But at the same time, I know just what he means. The word is wrong, but there's something exhilarating about a fight. The rush of adrenaline. Feeling justified because we got some bad guys and saved the good guy. We kept the girl safe. We didn't die.

There's a clarity to what we did today I appreciate. I've missed it, clarity.

But I don't want killing to ever be fun. I don't know if I want to be on Damon Salvatore's very short list of humans he gives two shits about. Being friends, or drinking buddies, or even comrades with the creature who took my wife from me seems like a betrayal. Of her. Of me.

He pauses, and when I don't answer he continues. "Oh, don't look at me like that. I know you hate me. Guess what?" He leans over and mock-whispers, "Everyone hates me."

I swallow the rest of my drink as he sits back. He says it lightly, like he teased Elena earlier. But I can hear the sting of truth behind his words. Damon's like me, an outsider. On the fringes, his nose pressed against windows.

"But you can't deny it: we were badass."

Dammit, we really were. We were fucking ferocious.

But I can't admit that, not to him. So instead I stand up, and before he can respond, hit him with a full right cross. I feel the satisfying crack as his jaw gives way beneath my fist. It's been a long time since I hit someone. Too long. And it feels good. I've forgotten how good.

If he were a man, he'd be on the floor and drinking his meals for a week. He's not, so my hand will hurt a lot longer than his face, but that doesn't bother me. The crack of a jaw beneath my fist is another clarity I've missed.

I leave without settling my bill. The bartender knows I'm good for it, but something tells me Damon will pick up my tab.

Before I can leave, Damon shrugs and says, "It happens," like it's no big deal. Like we fist-bumped or shoulder-patted instead of me cold-cocking him.

Yeah, he actually is pretty badasss. And maybe, if I'm honest with myself, I wouldn't mind being badass too.

* * *

_A/N: Delena fans, I just read a really beautiful long-term happily ever after story that I highly recommend, shipperjunkie's Landslide. _


	24. Brand New Day (-In-Day-Out)

_A/N: Expanded Damon POV following "Bring It On." Thanks, always and eternally, to CreepingMuse_

* * *

**Brand New Day(-In-Day-Out)**

"He's going to hate you for that," Elena matter of factly states after I put away my phone. Like everything else she's said these past few days, it's without judgment or accusation. She's merely pointing out the obvious and sounds vaguely bored.

"Yeah, well," I reply. "Emotions are overrated."

That's not entirely true, although there are plenty of emotions I'd put firmly on the "overrated" list, but she's busy pretending like she doesn't have any at the moment, so I'll play along. Besides, Stefan's spent much of our un-dead lives hating me, so I can handle a few more days. Hell, I could handle a few more decades. And it's his turn to clean up some messes anyway. I've done more than my share. Take that, little brother. Maybe Elena and I won't come back to Mystic Falls. Hell, I've been trying to escape practically since my return. Maybe we'll take this opportunity to hop across the pond and lose ourselves in Europe until this Silas thing blows over or he brings about the end of the world.

"You're lying," she sighs. "You care what Stefan thinks. You _care_, Damon." She says it like it's a dirty word.

"So do you, _Elena,_" I reply with a smile.

"I would've thought my attempt to stake Caroline showed just how little I care."

"Who hasn't fantasized about staking Caroline?" I ask. I lean closer and whisper because I want Elena to understand her secret's safe with me. "But you could've beaten Blondie's ass if you'd wanted to. She's not that much older than you, and Ric did train you well."

"Obviously not well enough," she says, her gaze focused on the dark road ahead.

I shrug, confident we both know the truth. "You heard me and Stef racing to her rescue. He's as stealthy as a someone with a wooden leg. We could start calling him ol' Brood Beard. You didn't want to kill her, so you wounded her pride instead. Maybe you're even a little bit justified. Maybe she deserves it a little for some of her mean girl antics."

"Why do you even give a shit?" she snaps. "Caroline hates you."

I know she can't stand me. Whatever. Join the fucking club 'cause that particular list's long and distinguished, but Blondie's earned her keep and then some. She's a less annoying version of Lexi. Good for Stefan. Moving up in the world. Making better choices when it comes to hot blonds he doesn't fuck.

"And Caroline Forbes is going to get up on her high horse and be all pissed because I roughed up her mom a little bit?" Elena continues to fume. "Liz is a liar. She tried to kill you and Stefan and Caroline not that long ago. Oh yeah, and she shot my brother."

Oh sure. Elena doesn't care about anything. Not at all. Not even a little bit. Uh-huh.

"Live and let live," I reply. "Speaking from experience, forever is a long time to hold grudges."

"What happened to kill or be killed?" Elena scoffs. "I thought we were vampires."

"They're not mutually exclusive concepts."

Elena once more stares out into the darkness, silent except for the occasional huffing of breath.

"You almost died for Caroline," bursts out of her, as if she'd been trying to hold in the words for some time and finally lost the battle with herself.

I remember the fire searing my veins as Tyler Lockwood's venom moved through my system, the haunting visions of Katherine and Elena swirling together until I wasn't sure what was real until I tasted her blood on my lips. Elena promised she wouldn't leave me. She was going to lay in my death bed and hold me until the ugly end because she'd seen me, all of me, and she liked me exactly the way I was anyway.

I wasn't going to argue with her when we both needed to just get the hell out, but fuck Elena's grand justification that I prefer her this way. I don't need Elena switched off to not care that I'm the bad guy because she already forgives me.

"Yep." I pop the "p" for emphasis.

"And now you're defending her? What's that all about? Did you let Tyler bite you instead of her for me?"

It's my turn to sigh because these are questions I'd rather not answer. Not now, and maybe not ever.

"Yes and no," I finally say.

"That's vague. What's the no part?"

"I should write a handbook for baby vampires so I don't have to keep repeating myself."

"I'm not a baby," she argues, sounding exactly like a child.

"Forever's a long time," I say again. "I don't like owing people. Regardless of Caroline's feelings for me, I consider us even. That, Elena, is what I care about."

She's quiet for several miles, twirling her hair around her finger while she looks out the window. She can bluff and swagger and lie to herself, if that feels good right now. She says she doesn't care, but she wakes up two or three times a night, her nightmares different variations on a similar theme: we're all dead, including her, and she's burning our decomposing corpses while gagging because of the stench. I alone get to be alive and bound and watching when she lights the match.

I don't need a psychology degree to interpret that one.

It's not her fault. She wasn't punishing me that first night when she tied me up and blindfolded me and left me alone to stew. She very easily could have hurt me, and that wouldn't have been her fault either. She needed space. I understand that. Fuck, I snapped Ric's neck that one time because I couldn't stand the way he was looking at me.

And it's not like I've never been tied up before.

I didn't know what to do, that first night she woke up, gasping for breath and scared out of her mind. I was rattling around in my own skin and feeling like complete useless shit. So I found myself singing the Italian lullabies my mother sang to me long before I spoke Italian and knew what the words meant.

The last time I sang those songs on was the battlefield. It was after dark, a new moon, and we were trying to sort through bodies and pilfer supplies without getting sniped from either friend or foe. There was a boy, and in the dark, with all the blood and the dirt, I had no idea which side he was on. He was young and so scared and obviously dying. He grabbed my hand and whispered, "Please," although I still don't know what he was asking me for. I couldn't think of anything to do, so I sang to him the songs I sang to Stefan when he was young and scared in the dark. By the time I was done, had sung every lullaby I knew, that boy was dead, and there were all these men standing around me, not moving, staring. I dropped the boy's hand and cleaned out his ammunition, adding it to my dwindling supply, before I moved on to the next body.

"Caroline and Stefan are hypocrites," Elena finally says.

"Fuck yeah," I agree, grateful to get out of my own head.

"They hated the sire bond, and they were mad at both of us, like it was somehow our fault, but they were all about you using it when it was convenient for them. The sire bond is stupid."

"Fucking understatement."

"And I'm done with people telling me what to do. You included. I'm tired of doing the right thing and not disappointing people."

"Is that what you're doing?" I ask. "Disappointing people?"

"I like the look of shock on their faces when I do something they can't imagine poor, sweet, innocent Elena would ever even think about," she says with a grin. "It's fun."

"Is that why you keep stripping in front of Stefan?" I ask. "Because it's so shocking and fun?"

Elena giggles, the sound identical to Katherine's signature response. I have to grip the steering wheel to keep from wincing, and the leather-covered metal bends in protest.

"Are you jealous?" she asks, glancing at me through her eyelashes, another Katherine move. "Because I still don't want to fuck him even though he's hot."

Goody. Glad I can cross that off the list of shit to worry about.

She slides across the seat and nuzzles her nose into my neck. She licks the vein in my throat while one hand threads in my hair and the other reaches for the front of my jeans.

Fuck.

Maybe I was wrong. Maybe I should have just let her freak the fuck out because her brother was dead. Maybe that's what normal people should do and I had no right to make her flip her switch so she can pretend she doesn't care. I don't fucking know. I have enough problems making my own shitty decisions without being responsible for hers too. All I know is that she was on the floor and hurting, and I don't want her to hurt like that. Not ever. Not if I can do anything about it.

"I'm not jealous," I tell her. "Although something tells me you are."

She pulls back and stares at me. "How so?"

"Your sudden anger at Caroline has nothing to do with the fact that she and Stefan have, as you call it, a _thing_?"

"No," she answers too quickly. "So what if she's a tramp and makes him laugh and smile and have fun when all I've ever done is make him feel guilty? So he danced with her at a party without her having to beg him? I don't care."

"Oh no," I quietly agree. "You obviously don't care at all."

"I don't."

"Fine," I say. "You don't care."

"Fuck you, Damon. I don't."

"I said fine," I repeat.

She huffs and fidgets and stews for a minute or two. "And why does he think I'm all his fault anyway?" she adds. "Why am I his broken toy? It's annoying. No, it's more than annoying. It's offensive. I'm offended."

Yep. She definitely doesn't care.

"That's just Stefan's thing," I say. "I think it's easier for him to feel responsible for other people's guilt, rather than his own. Anything to not throw away our rings and turn ourselves into funeral pyres, you know? Want me to repeat my Live and Let Live speech? I can make it longer this time."

"So many reasons to take off my clothes in front of Stefan," she answers, like the previous part of the conversation doesn't exist.

Her fingers tease my cock through my jeans. I keep thinking it's going to get tired. But it doesn't. It immediately rises to the occasion, hardens for her even though it's uncomfortably trapped in denim. My zipper digs painfully into the tender skin. I should start wearing underwear for my own safety.

"Do I have to pick just one?" she whispers into my ear, the delicate tip of her tongue dipping inside before she bites down on my earlobe.

"No," I casually say, as if she isn't practically sitting in my lap and trying to jerk me off through my pants. "We'll be driving for a few hours. Make a list, if that's what you want. I made a list of all the things Klaus sucks at earlier today. It was fun. I'm considering compiling lists for everyone in the gang."

Oh yeah. Lists are super fun. And after this field trip, I expect the cavalry will have a list of all the ways it's my fault 'cause I'm a fucked up piece of shit. Knowing Caroline, she'll make a Power Point presentation, complete with colored graphs. And it really sucks Jeremy's dead because without him, I'll just have to imagine all the things Ric is saying about the ways I'm fucking up. While my imagination is quite vivid and I've had plenty of accusations and curses hurled my way over the decades, I'd like to hear his own words. Knowing Ric, they're real zingers.

The bitch of it is I didn't do a fucking thing to help her because it's still there. All that hurt and pain and grief and fucking misery. She just doesn't consciously know it because she's too busy pretending like she doesn't care. But it's seeping back into her mind, no matter how desperately she needs these days or months of peace. Fuck, I needed entire decades, and I remember well those nightmares, the old ones from the war twisted into my own personal vampire tales of death and destruction. And if I'm not good enough and fast enough to stop her, maybe she'll do something really stupid to feel shitty about too.

"Damon," she whispers as she unbuckles my belt and eases down my zipper. She pulls out my cock and strokes it. "If I were to blow you right now, would you crash your precious car?"

"Doubtful," I reply in a nonchalant voice. "I'm a very experienced driver, and I have quick reflexes. And what about that list? I'm waiting."

"You want to talk about Stefan right now?" she sulks. "When I'm offering to blow you?" When I don't answer, her fingers painfully squeeze me before she pushes away and settles back at her end of the seat.

"Fine. Have it your way. First," she says, holding up a finger. "Watching Stefan squirm is fun. He's quite the prude, which I don't get because he's hot. He could be up to his eyeballs in pussy if he wanted, and yet he doesn't. Showing him what he wants but can't have amuses me."

"In defense of my baby brother's sexual prowess, he's spent most of his un-life either ripping people into bloody bits or trying really hard not to. He's been busy. And, as I recall, you weren't complaining about his prudishness before."

"Two," she continues, as if I haven't spoken. "Who cares if he sees me naked? He's seen me before. He's seen Katherine, and we're identical. It's not like it's something new. I won't be getting any dollars from him anytime soon."

"Fair point."

"Three," she says. "I like being naked." She shrugs. "I like the way the air feels on my skin."

I smile. "Yeah, I remember that, from early on." I nod. "Yeah."

"And four, I'm hot."

"You are," I agree. "Flaunt it 'cause you've got it."

"Exactly," she agrees. "So why not be naked even though it makes him uncomfortable? Seems like that's his problem, not mine."

She reaches for my hand and grips it between her thighs. It's met with a flood of damp heat as she wiggles her hips and rubs her clit against my knuckles.

"Speaking of problems," she says in a breathy voice. "Maybe you can help me with one."

Elena's demanding things I didn't expect for another few years, maybe even a decade. She's a girl, an inexperienced girl. Her bumbling childhood romance with Mr. All-American Wonder Bread Boy certainly didn't fulfill her. And Stefan probably had to focus on not killing her when she was naked in his bed. So she didn't know how to get what she wanted until I showed her. That first morning after the fire, when she woke up in my bed, hungry in every sense of the word, I whispered into her ear, "Show me what feels good."

The Elena I know would've been embarrassed. She may or may not have followed my instructions, but if she had, it would've taken a great deal of coaxing and reassurance and probably plenty of darkness. This Elena? She spread her sleepy legs without hesitation. I slid down, my head resting on one thigh while I watched, pulling her fingers into my mouth. I sucked and nipped and swirled my tongue around them, getting them good and wet, before placing them where she needed them to be.

"Show me," I repeated.

She inserted a single wet finger.

"More," I directed her. "Use another finger."

She slipped a second one inside.

"That's right," I quietly encouraged. "Now use your thumb on your clit."

I kept my eyes focused on what was in front of me, not peeking to see if she was watching, or if her eyes were still closed. I repositioned her wrist. "Curl the tips of your fingers. Can you feel it? There should be..."

She cried out.

"Right there," I whispered. "That's your sweet spot."

A fine sheen of sweat covered her beautiful skin as she writhed and moaned and gasped and reached for what she needed.

It should have been beautiful, watching Elena make herself come in my bed with the morning sunlight pouring through the windows. But I buried my face in her soft thigh like a coward and tried not to be a complete fucking pussy and cry because it was the worst sort of blasphemy. She uses me like I used all those people, debauched them and let them debauch me. All the fucking I've done over the past decades was a means to an end. I'm quite proficient, and I don't want to fuck, not ever again.

Elena's different. She resurrected that long-dead part of me, that boy who went off to war and never came back. She awakened me, and I wanted to do the same for her. I wanted us to explore and learn and figure things out together. I wanted to make love. And those precious times before the sire-bond bombshell, I was stupid enough to think that's exactly what we were doing.

She wants it rough, most of the time. Hard fucking, my hips thrusting at vampire speed, the force enough to crush a human pelvis.

She gets bored easily, so I switch it up, moving her body to find new angles and please her. I flip her and pull her hips so her ass is in the air and take her hard from behind. I bend her over the sofa. Up against the wall. On the counter in the kitchen. Against the open refrigerator, the cold air sending shivers through her as I fuck her.

In the shower. In the tub. In the bed. On the stairs. On all fours like dogs. In the woods with rough leaves beneath us and sticks poking my knees.

"Damon," she whines when I don't move my fingers. She squirms impatiently. "Come on."

"If we keep stopping, we'll never get there," I reason, putting my hand back on the wheel.

"I thought you wanted to show me a good time?" she sulks.

"I do," I say. "But first we have to get there."

"Why New York?" she asks. "Why not some other city?"

"I love New York," I honestly tell her. That, and if she kills someone, at least she won't know them. "I lived there for a while."

"Who's the man in your picture? Are we going to see him?"

"His name's Will," I say with a sigh. "I killed him today."

She looks at me, cocking her head to the side. "You're upset."

"Yeah," I quietly answer. "I am."

"Then why did you kill him?"

"It's complicated."

"Did you fuck him?"

"So many questions," I say instead of answering.

Elena huffs.

New York in the 70s and 80s was a glorious time. After the sexual revolution but before AIDS. Everyone was higher than a fucking kite, and it was all sweaty sex and mountains of cocaine, and yeah, the music mostly sucked, but nothing's perfect. I'd get contact buzz from the blood, and I didn't even have to compel people back then. I'd tell them I'm a vampire and wanted to drink from them while we fucked, and they'd beg me to. We all thought we were Superman.

"I wanted to come to New York this summer," I quietly say. "The four of us. Spend a week or two. Ric vetoed me."

"Why?"

"He questioned his parenting skills in a major metropolitan area."

"No," she says, shaking her head. "Why did you want to bring us to New York?"

"Family vacation," I say with a shrug. "Change of scenery. Good food. Nice stores. Beautiful art to look at. Shows to see. Strange and interesting people to watch."

"Strange and interesting people to eat," she corrects.

"You were human then," I remind her. "And you would've been quite displeased if I'd eaten anyone."

"I was such a drag," she says. "Talk about buzz kill. I don't know why you put up with me."

Those couple of months, before Stefan came back, were the best of my life. I was worried about Stefan, sure, but I've always worried about Stefan. The four of us were a strange little of family. Ric and I drinking, his back all jacked up because he was sleeping on the too-short couch where we burned Jeremy's body. Cooking dinner and Andie's incredible legs wrapped around my hips in the bathtub and making Elena breakfast in the mornings and the first night I held her spooned against my chest while she slept and playing video games with Jeremy and the almost-but-not-quite-flirting and teaching Elena how to play poker and just...

I sigh.

All of it. Every precious, boring second of that life. It's almost worth bringing back all those other dead creatures just to get that back. To hell with the consequences.

I swallow the lump that's stuck in my throat.

"I thought Ric would have fun playing school teacher and boring us to death," I say.

All the things we could have done but didn't linger unspoken in the air, thick with regret and loss and sadness. I almost wish I could turn off my switch too, even though it would mean, at least on the surface, I wouldn't care about the things that matter most.

God fucking dammit, I don't want to feel. Not this.

Elena is silent beside me, and I wonder if she's thinking the same thing. I open my mouth, but close it when I smell it. The unmistakable scent of tears. It's faint, and her cheeks are dry, but they're there. They're right there, wanting to tumble down her cheeks, but she's not letting them.

I arrange my dick in my pants and pull myself back together.

"Come on," I quietly say.

She's staring out the window, refusing to look at me.

"Come on." I gently pull her leg so it's resting across my lap, behind the shifter. "That's it," I say. "Get comfy." She leans back against the car door. "Here." I reach in the backseat and hand her my jacket. "Use that as a pillow."

I wait while she fidgets and adjusts and squirms and sighs. Finally, she's still.

"Close your eyes," I say.

"I told you," she says with a glare. "I'm tired of people telling me what to do."

"Close your eyes," I quietly repeat. "Please."

She waits a few seconds before doing as I ask. As soon as they're closed, I pull off her boot and sock and toss them into the backseat. She offers me the other leg and I do the same. She wiggles her bare toes on my lap and with the hand not on the wheel, I rub her feet. It's not my best effort, given I can only use the one hand, but I take my time.

We have all the time in the world.

She drops her right leg to the floor, and once more my nose is assaulted with her scent.

"Damon," she whispers, her eyes still closed. "Please."

I don't let her rush me. My fingers take their time, dancing up her calf and playing underneath her knee. She squirms when they flirt with her thigh, and she reaches up pull down her leggings.

"Nope," I say, swatting away her hand.

"Damon," she whines.

"Relax," I tell her. "Do you trust me?"

She opens her eyes and glares at me again.

"Do you?"

"I need to come, dammit."

"Do you trust me?" I ask again.

She doesn't answer, but she dutifully closes her eyes and settles back against the seat and the window, her head cushioned with my jacket.

I use the soft fabric to my advantage, teasing her through the layer of clothes, letting it absorb her heat and wetness. I listen carefully to her breathing and bring her right to the edge and back off. And again. And a third time. When she finally comes, it's long and deep and lingering. Rather than the screaming bursts of sensation, like she's been doing the past couple of days, she whimpers and gasps and grips my wrist while my fingers work their magic, bringing her a second and then a third release.

"Better?" I quietly ask.

"Mmmm."

I return my hand to the steering wheel, and before I can blink, Elena is curled up next to me, awkward around the gear shift, her head on my lap.

"I don't want to fall asleep," she murmurs. "I feel too good to fall asleep."

I run my fingers through her hair, gently working out the tangles.

"It's okay," I assure her. "You can sleep."

* * *

_A/N: I'm sticking to my theory that Caroline fixed the vervain in the water. And I prefer my interpretation of switched-of vampires too. So.. well... yeah._


	25. I Want To Be Sedated

_A/N: Expanded Damon POV from 4.17, "Because of Night."_

* * *

**I Want To Be Sedated**

Fucking fuck fuck fuck.

I sigh as the door from the roof bangs hollowly behind me.

She wishes things had gone differently.

Yeah. Just.

Dammit. Shit. Hell. Fuck.

I have nothing left to say because sometimes there just aren't enough expletives.

I grab a bottle of bourbon from behind the bar and take a long swallow. I push aside the left-behind glasses so they crash to the floor and sprawl across the scratched wood surface and gulp from the bottle. It's the cheap shit, not what I'd normally drink, but desperate times and all. Will would be cursing me right now for the mess. He was actually pretty tidy for a punk and a pack-rat. Except he can't curse at me because I killed him before Rebekah could figure out the Katherine-connection, which was all for nothing because she and Elena are hot on the trail anyway.

In my fucking Camaro.

Will's probably on the Other Side alternating between laughing at me and hurling his own useless expletives, and I'd love to hear them if only Jeremy were here to translate. Except, oh yeah, Jeremy's dead too. Although, if Stefan's doom-and-gloom "I couldn't stop the impending apocalypse" is anything to go by, this mysterious veil is about to drop, and Ric, Will, and Jeremy will come back and kick my ass for so royally fucking up.

Actually, that doesn't sound too terrible. Maybe, when they're finished, we could all get good and wasted together before the rest of a lifetime of enemies can gather at the gates to kill me.

Or fuck it. Stefan could just be his usual, melodramatic self. Hard to tell, really. If I believed him every time he thought the world was coming to an end, I'd have spent the past 170 years in a bunker eating Twinkies and cold beans straight from the can.

Fuck me. Hard. Maybe with a chainsaw.

I used to think loving Elena was death by a thousand tiny cuts. Not anymore. Nope. This Elena leaves big, gaping holes. She does it with a toss of cherry-tinted curls and a smile that takes away my breath. She pouts those delectable lips when she asks if she hurt my feelings, right before Rebekah snaps my neck and they leave me dead on the rooftop.

Pride. Motherfucking pride.

Oh, the irony, since I'd just threatened to snap her fucking neck. My clever girl.

I deserve this. I do. For all the things I've done and will continue to do. For all the sins I refuse to apologize for relishing and committing.

But if Rebekah hadn't shown up, I wonder if Elena would've wanted me to stop kissing her. I knew she was playing me, the whole wide-innocent-eyed, "I've never done it on a rooftop before," game. Like I didn't see that coming from a mile away. Amateur. That, and she's still the world's worst liar.

She reached into my pocket too soon, should've waited until I was good and distracted, like I did with Lexi. I led her on for six fucking months to make sure I got what I wanted, which was total annihilation. True, Elena doesn't have six months because the Race for the Cure is on. But she could've spared six minutes. Elena's young and impatient. She hasn't figured out that forever is stretching out before her.

I hope it was Elena who went fishing in my pockets for the keys. And they'd better not wreck my Camaro or heads will roll. Literally. Sadly, of the two, Elena has more experience driving, and doesn't that just say it all.

I swallow the rest of the bourbon and drop the empty bottle onto the floor, where it shatters and joins the rest of the shards. My phone vibrates, and when I see it's Stefan again, not Elena, I don't answer. Jesus. His impulse-control issues aren't limited to blood consumption. Any second now, he's going to start texting.

Without looking, my hand reaches for another bottle, and I end up with cheap tequila instead of cheap bourbon. This day just gets better and better, and I haven't even eaten breakfast. But I gulp the shit anyway because I need everything to stop for a minute. Just one fucking minute of peace because, once again, the plan has gone to shit. All hell has broken loose. Only this time it might not be metaphorical hell. And Elena and Rebekah have stolen my car and are on a wild-joy ride to find Katherine and turn Rebekah into a real girl. Just what the world needs is more of that DNA.

Right on cue, my phone vibrates a text alert. I don't even bother looking. Yes, Stefan. I know. It's terrible. It's horrible. I need to find Elena. I need to come home. I need to save the fucking world.

I lay on Will's bar and swallow more tequila instead.

The thing is, I know Elena, and I know that despite how desperately she needs to believe otherwise, she's still in there. Stefan is a bigger fucking moron than I thought if he honestly believes she's ruthless. He sees that because all he sees when he looks at her is himself.

Elena, above everything else, loves. God, that girl loves. Infuriatingly so. Her whole "I'm not taking the cure" has nothing to do with how much fun she's having as a vampire because she's really not and everything to do with the fact that she doesn't want to be the only one to have it because Elena loves people she hasn't met and people she can't stand.

Coincidence that even without the benefit of juice boxes thanks to yours truly and switched off she's only killed one person, and Connor had a stake in her gut and threatened her brother? Fuck no.

I loved Katherine when I was switched off. I loved Stefan. Elena loves. She just wants to pretend right now like she doesn't. Because Elena is the only other person I've ever known who understands what it means to love: love is devastating. To love is to risk breaking your own heart because no matter what, regardless of all the beautiful moments in between, that's how the story ends. In heartbreak.

Love fucking sucks, but we keep doing it anyway, god help us.

So she wants to pretend right now that she can't love, or doesn't care. Whatever. Fine, if that's what makes her smile and dance and dye tiny sections of her hair to look like a Jolly Rancher. It's fucking adorable. I want to lay in bed with her tucked safely in my arms and count every last candy-colored strand. I can live with that for a while, until she's strong enough to face the world again. Until she wants to smile and dance because she's happy for real, not just because the sensations feel good. And for a second, for a split second, I think maybe that kiss on the roof wasn't about her using me to get what she wants. I think she meant it.

I swallow.

Maybe I'm just deluding myself. I don't fucking know. Like I have any answers. But I think she wanted to kiss me with the lights of New York glittering like stars close enough to touch. I think she wanted more than a kiss, and not just because she's a newborn vampire who always wants to fuck. I think maybe, just maybe, it's me. But hell if I know because if it's not Stefan or a sire bond or the end of the world, Rebekah's there to cock-block.

Jesus, she and Stefan really are perfect for each other. But on the plus side, I can think of worse partners in crime for Elena than Rebekah, and not just because of the visual.

Fuck me. Last night, the two of them feeding on that girl, the taste of her blood still thick on my tongue. I want credit for walking away from that show and doing what needs to be done instead of playing. I want lots and lots of credit. And maybe a gold star too. That shit was hot.

But I really am trying to do right by her. So she doesn't end up like me, waking up one day and hating herself. She's better than that. Deserves more than to follow in my fucked-up footsteps. That's all I want: Elena safe and happy. I'd prefer her safe and happy and with me, but I'm not even that picky. I'm just pathetic.

So pathetic that all those years, all those 5'7" brunette IDs I stole for Will, were for Katherine fucking Pierce. It never occurred to me that she wasn't right where I thought she was, trapped and waiting for me to come to her rescue.

Love sucks.

Of course, Will never told me who the identities were for, and I never asked. Will and I...

I swallow the rest of the cheap tequila and let the bottle shatter on the floor. My hand finds cheap vodka next.

Will and I weren't exclusive. But the mornings I awoke in his bed in his basement apartment under the club, his hair sticking up all over the place and the scruff on his face so rough it burned when he kissed me, he'd groan and try to tempt me back into his arms. "I'm stuck until dark," he'd whisper into my chest, blunt teeth teasing my nipples. They were pierced back then, and he'd tug on the hoops with his tongue, sending shivers through my chest. "Stay with me."

Sometimes I let him tempt me. Most of the time I didn't. And he didn't hold it against me, just rolled over and pretended to go back to sleep rather than watch me pull on my jeans and boots and walk away without looking back.

Lexi pissed him off though. Made him jealous, I think, because I never brought anyone else to his club. But mostly, I think he was tired of cleaning up after our fights. The night after I left her trapped on the rooftop, huddled into the tiny sliver of shade, Will asked where she was. I assured him he wouldn't see her again, at least not with me. He looked both worried and relieved. After he'd closed the club, when we were in his bed, slick with sweat and gasping for breath, our legs entwined and his head resting on my shoulder, he asked what happened.

"I fucked her," I said. In every possible way a person could be fucked. Literally and metaphorically speaking.

"Why?" he asked.

I didn't want to explain that it was a message to my brother. I was pissed that Stefan cared just enough to be a coward and send her instead of coming himself. That, and I'm quite certain Stefan and Lexi, for all their years together, never were _together_. Not once, not ever. But I got her. She hates me, and in those moments, I got her to see me and see her own good works and fall in love with me, but really just fall in love with herself.

I fucked her but good when my brother couldn't. I took a girl who means the world to him and used her and threw her away because I could. Because the one girl who mattered to me wasn't only mine, and I made certain Lexi was no longer only Stefan's.

It wasn't even bad. Lexi was a fine looking woman, and she was older and stronger than me, and not by a little bit, but she didn't overpower me. She let us be equals. It was actually... surprisingly kind of nice. Skilled, passionate, but sweet, too. God, she was so sweet.

And she'd never tell Stefan. That was the beauty of it. It'd be our little secret because Lexi was humiliated. Ashamed. But she would go back to him and say I was a lost cause. She would hate me forever, and maybe he would too.

"Damon," Will said, propping up on an elbow so he could look at me. "We could be..." his voice trailed off. "More than business."

I grabbed his cock and thumbed the wetness from the tip so it slipped in my hand.

"I thought our arrangement was mutually beneficial."

Will closed his eyes and grunted, thrusting his hips against my hand.

"It is, Damon," he gasped. "But we could be more. You're..." He gulped in air. "So much more."

I sucked his bottom lip into my mouth, nicking it with my fangs and tasting his blood as I pumped him until he came with a cry. His head was limp on the pillow as he took ragged breaths through his mouth.

Will was so beautiful.

"I can't, Will," I quietly said. "I don't have anything else to give you."

Before he'd caught his breath, I was reaching for my pants.

"No, please," he said. "Don't. I didn't mean. You don't have to."

I leaned over and kissed his forehead. "It's been fun, Will."

"Damon."

I walked out carrying my shirt and my jacket, my unfastened belt clinking with each stride.

Out of sight, out of mind, and I didn't give Will another thought until I killed him in that parking lot. He didn't get the Rose treatment, pretty lies to die to, although he was a nice guy with wonderful bed hair who maybe, if I had let him, maybe he would've loved me.

Now Will's dead. I don't know what will happen to this bar, or all the vampires who count on him for their stolen identities. Elena is out there somewhere with Rebekah, tracking down Katherine for a cure she doesn't even want to take. And maybe not today, and maybe not tomorrow, but if I can't get her back soon, she's going to do something she's going to regret. She's going to do something she can't ever take back, no matter how sorry she is. Because all the apologies in the world don't change a goddamn thing which is why I never bother with them.

Maybe Rebekah will stop being selfish and neurotic and terrified long enough to keep Elena safe. Maybe Rebekah will comfort her when she wakes up in the night because she's dreaming of rotting corpses and fires. Maybe Rebekah will count the newly dyed candy-colored hairs and think they're adorable. Maybe they're having wild girl-on-girl action in the backseat of my car while I lay here on Will's bar and drink cheap booze.

It doesn't matter. Not really. Because regardless of what Elena does, I know the end of my story: I love her.

My phone vibrates with another call from Stefan. I'm not even fucking drunk yet. What could possibly have happened in the time since we spoke on the roof?

Actually, I don't want to know because, as it turns out, the real horrors sneak up and happen in a blink of an eye. A beat of a heart. Just a flash, not even an entire second, and the world as you know it no longer exists. Who the fuck needs Silas for an actual apocalypse when we're on the verge of our own personal hells every second of every day?


	26. Casting Stones With Bloodied Hands

_A/N: Extended Klaus POV from 4.17, Because the Night_

* * *

**Casting Stones With Bloodied Hands**

I realize what Caroline intends to do a moment too late. "No!" I bellow, my hand reaching for hers. Stefan reaches too, but neither of us are quick enough. She reaches the witch holding the knife before we can stop her. There is nothing to do except stand and gape as, one by one, the twelve witches slump to the ground. The torches extinguish until we are left in darkness.

I have no objection, on principle, to killing. But there is a time to incapacitate, and there is a time to understand sacrifices must be made. The little witch is the key to Silas' spell, and her death was the expedient way to end this madness.

Caroline, for all her admonishing and self-righteous speeches and unsanitary drinking to spite me, just brought about the end of the world to save a single girl.

"The Lockwood's is the closest," Stefan quietly tells me, his eyes on Caroline. "I'll grab a couple shovels and be right back." The impulsive Stefan I was first drawn to was more fun, but still I appreciate his methodical attention to detail.

Caroline ignores me and speaks to her unconscious friend while Stefan is gone. She smooths her hair, begs forgiveness for youthful slights, and reminisces about childhood mischief. I'm nearing the end of my patience for such theatrics when Caroline abruptly stops speaking and looks at me.

"Tyler gave Matt the house," she says with a gasp.

"So you said."

"Stefan won't be able to get in."

I sigh in exasperation. It's not like her to not only sit still for so long, but also be so blatantly stupid. It's nearly dawn; the boy is asleep in his new bed and won't hesitate to invite Stefan inside if that were necessary, which it is not.

"Are there servants living in the tool shed?" I ask.

"No," she slowly replies, looking confused.

"Then Stefan doesn't require an invitation to nick shovels." Right on cue, Stefan flashes back to the clearing, a shovel in each hand. I gesture to him. "See?"

Caroline looks at Stefan and tears well in her eyes. They'd exchanged meaningful looks all day, not even waiting until they presumed I wasn't paying attention. As irritating as I find them, it makes a certain sense that the two people I have an irrational fondness for are drawn to each other.

"Bonnie's not waking up," she whispers.

"She's fine," I snap.

Stefan glares as he hands me the shovels. He leans over and places one of Caroline's hands over Bonnie heart. "Listen, Caroline," he calmly says. "Feel that? She's okay."

"As I just said."

"I can't lose anyone else, Stefan," Caroline tearfully says. "I can't. I just can't. There's been too many..."

"Caroline," Stefan says, thankfully interrupting her before she works up enough momentum to lose control. "Bonnie's okay."

I roll my eyes at her childish concerns.

"Why won't she wake up?"

"I don't know," Stefan gently tells her. "Maybe it's because of the spell? But she's breathing normally. Her heart rate is steady. She's not bleeding. Listen." He holds his hand on Caroline's, and they're silent for long seconds. "See? She's okay."

"Yes, luv, you saved her," I say. "Well done."

"Klaus," Stefan says.

"Take the witch home, Stefan," I order before he can start scolding me as well. Stefan taking her side against me, as he undoubtedly will, is more than I can tolerate at the moment. "Caroline believes I'm too terrible to trust with her."

Stefan gives me a pained look as he gently gathers the girl in his arms.

"Cut her some slack," he says under his breath, as if Caroline can't hear him.

"Well, unfortunately for Caroline, terrible people aren't sensitive to the feelings of others. She'll have to manage."

Stefan sighs and furrows his brow instead of arguing further on Caroline's behalf. "What about?" He looks around at the twelve bodies still lying in a circle around us rather than asking the question aloud.

"Caroline and I shall tidy up here. Wait with the witch and see what she knows."

Stefan turns to Caroline. "My phone's on."

"As is mine," I tell him. "Call me when she wakes up."

Stefan nods and flashes off in a different direction, leaving me alone with Caroline.

She slowly rises from the ground, moves to a nearby rock, and sits down. I clear my throat and wait for her to do something other than sit in stony silence and stare at nothing, but she doesn't. It's unlike her to not be busy in a crisis, which concerns me.

She looks young and frightened, her arms wrapped around herself as if she's cold.

I suspect that despite her maniacal efforts to aspire and perspire that I find endearing under normal circumstances, she's never dug a grave. They aren't traditionally considered "beautification," although they should be. A well dug grave is far more aesthetically pleasing than a rotting corpse left out to be devoured by animals.

One big grave for the lot of them would be more simple, but there's something unseemly about a mass grave. So I strip off my shirt and start digging twelve graves. Twelve individual graves in twelve different locations scattered around the clearing so if one body is found, the others won't necessarily be uncovered as well. I dig deeply, the holes perfectly rectangular, their sides straight and even.

Everything worth doing requires specific skill, determination, and precision. Caroline knows this well, though she might not realize digging graves is no exception. You can't tentatively dig a proper grave. If you underestimate the size of your hole, dig it too small or with sloped edges, it will collapse in on itself. You'll be forced to either leave it too shallow or repetitiously move the same dirt.

I learned how to dig a grave the hard way, when I was a human. The blisters on my hands didn't immediately heal. They burst and bled before oozing and crusting, making simple tasks painful. For weeks, my hands constantly reminded me of my failures and my sins.

Father stood and watched as I dug Henrik's grave. He didn't utter a single word, merely huffed his displeasure when the sides crumbled on top of me. It took hours. Much longer than it took Mother and Rebekah to wash Henrik's body and wrap it in a shroud for burial. Henrik had to wait for me to finish.

Elijah tried to help, but Father stopped him. One eye was swelling shut and blood dripped from his split lip, but Elijah refused to leave. His silent presence was a comfort I didn't deserve. He stood on the other side of the unfinished grave, away from Father's fists, his hands folded respectfully in front of him.

The hole got deeper. It got harder to toss the dirt up over the side. Dirt and stones kept falling into my eyes, and when I wiped my face, the tears and the blood on my hands just smeared it into a muddy mess.

"Niklaus," Elijah quietly said at last, when more dirt fell on top of me and back into the hole.

I'd let a sob escape that time, biting down on my own cheek to try and keep it inside. Father snorted his contempt.

"Look at what you're doing. You're making it harder."

"I can't see," I whispered, my voice cracking.

He stripped off his shirt and crouched down to hand it to me. While I wiped my face, he used his hands to pull the pile of dirt away from the edge of the grave so it wouldn't keep falling back into the hole.

"Straight sides," he whispered so Father couldn't hear. "You can do this."

I nodded as I handed him back his shirt. He winced when he saw my hands even though his face looked dreadful. Before I could stop him, he tore his shirt in two and leaned into the grave. He wrapped my bloody hands with the cloth and kissed my filthy forehead.

"You're good at this," Caroline finally says as I climb out of the tenth grave.

"I'm quite good at many things," I snap as I stretch my shoulders.

She shakes her head. "I didn't realize..." her voice trails off.

"There's a great deal you've not bothered to learn about me," I tell her. I nod towards the second shovel. "It's time for you to be useful."

She shakes her head. "No, I don't think..."

"Stand up, Caroline," I demand before she finishes her excuse. I am not in the mood to listen to her whine about fallen friends and how much has been lost. Nor do I fancy another lecture on what she perceives to be my many short-comings or her rationalization for what she did and how that somehow equates to her being better than I am.

She hesitates for a moment before rising from the rock. "Pick up the shovel." She grips it so tightly in her hands I'm concerned the handle will break. "Would you prefer to dig or fill this one?"

"I don't," she stutters. "I can't."

"You will."

I drop the body of a young man into the grave and begin shoveling dirt. She winces every time my shovel chops into the pile. There's the distinctive sound of dirt and stones filling in around him. Once his body is covered, I jump down and tightly pack the dirt. His bones crack under the force, the broken pieces settling into the earth.

She audibly swallows and closes her eyes.

"Your turn," I tell her. "Finish."

She shakes her head again. "I..." I'm silent as she swallows several times. "I think I'm going to be..."

She turns and flashes a short distance away before retching onto the ground. She drops to her knees and holds back her hair with one hand. I remain in the clearing, leaning against the shovel as she heaves and cries.

This was actually a rather tidy massacre. Just the one stab wound, and I buried that witch first. There isn't blood to deal with or spare parts to collect. I've allowed her to brood too long. She needs to be otherwise occupied.

After wiping her mouth with her sleeve, she slowly returns to the clearing.

"Feel better, luv?"

She shakes her head.

"No," she whispers. "I feel terrible."

I appreciate her word choice. Caroline and I, by her own logic, are equally terrible now. Her harsh accusations are as applicable to her own actions, ergo as applicable to her. We are the same.

I shrug. "No matter. It's time to redefine excellence." I retrieve the dropped shovel and put it in her hands. "Would it be helpful to refer to ourselves as the Burial Committee?"

"I did this," she whispers.

"Actually, luv, I've done all the work cleaning up your mess."

"I can't fix this," she murmurs. "I can't... There's nothing..."

"Shovel," I say, effectively ceasing her building hysteria.

I turn away from her and start digging the next grave. It's deep enough that I have to get into it when I look and see she hasn't moved.

"Shovel, Caroline."

I wait and watch as she awkwardly scoops dirt into the hole. I sigh and climb out of the partially dug grave and reposition her hands on the handle.

"Like this," I say. "I don't fancy being here all day."

When I see she's going to keep at it, I return my attention to the task at hand.

"You'll want to occasionally jump down and tightly pack the dirt," I mention as I drop the eleventh body into its grave.

"Why?"

"So when you get to the top, there isn't a mound to give it away."

"That sound," she whispers.

"Not to worry," I cheerfully assure her. "I already broke all his bones."

She swallows several times and takes deep breaths. I'm about to order her back to work when she pushes up her sleeves and jumps down, packing the dirt in the grave. When she climbs out, she positions her hands like I showed her and shovels.

She's still working when I start on the final grave, and by the time I'm finished, she's finally completed her small task. She did fairly well. I chop my shovel into the ground and inspect her grave.

"You have to blend the displaced dirt," I instruct. I step in behind her and place my hands on top of hers on the handle. She flinches when I my chest brushes against her back, but I persist. I guide her movements, showing her how to smooth the earth until all traces of the grave have vanished.

"You have a tattoo," she quietly says.

"I have several."

She turns and stands too close. With a single finger, she traces one of the black birds inked on my chest.

"I didn't know you had tattoos."

"As I mentioned before, there's a great deal about me you don't care to know."

I step away her and her finger that lingers on my bare chest. I'm sweaty and covered with dirt when I pull my shirt back on and survey the clearing. These are much nicer graves than I was able to dig for my brother. But like Henrik's, there are no stones to mark the resting place of the witches.

She's returned to her rock, silently sitting once more as she gazes around the clearing.

"There," I say. I chop her shovel into the dirt a final time. "Twelve graves for twelve witches. Like it never happened." I adjust my sleeves. "Only it did happen."

I retrieve my jacket because she's just sitting there, looking lost and frightened. I want to pull her into my arms. I want to kiss her forehead and whisper that she's strong and courageous and capable, like Elijah did for me all those years ago. But I can't. She'll hold any kindness against me and remind me later how monstrous I am and will forever be. My affections for this child have come at too high a price. The cost has been too dear for the meager glimmers of light she's shown me.

"Now, thanks to you, Silas has everything he needs to open the gates to hell on earth."

Admittedly, I did my part in the impending doom. I, however, did not understand the significance of my hybrids' deaths. Caroline knew the consequences of the witch sacrifice and unwisely chose to save a single friend.

"You were going to let Bonnie die," she accuses.

Indeed I was, Caroline. And your precious Stefan was going to allow her to die as well. Because we aren't sentimental fools and that one death would have put an end to Silas' plan.

"I know arithmetic isn't your strong point, but one is still fewer than twelve."

"Yeah," she retorts, standing at last to glare at me as an equal. "But that one was my best friend."

I shrug. By saving the one best friend, she's put everyone else, including herself and all the other people she holds dear, at risk. Excellent rationalization.

"Tell yourself whatever you need to sleep at night."

Caroline looks away from me, her eyes sweeping across the clearing, at the graves she can't distinguish from the surrounding ground because I, too, am capable of making things beautiful.

"I just killed twelve people," she finally says. Her words are choked. She's gasping, as if she might sob or collapse or be sick again. "Twelve," she whispers. Her eyes are wide and terrified as they dart around the clearing. "Twelve," she repeats.

The number is far less significant than the importance of the sacrifice. But seeing her panic, I'm reminded how young she is. She judges me so harshly because she hasn't lived long enough. She doesn't understand because she's been too well looked after and coddled.

"Hey," I whisper, putting my hands on her shoulders. I squeeze hard enough to get her attention because I need her to look at me and calm down, but I'm careful not to harm her.

Caroline needs me be darker than she is, the monstrous thing that cares for just one person. The terrible creature who would choose her over the rest of the world.

"You look like you're in need of comfort."

She doesn't move or respond, but the tears threatening to spill down her cheeks are my answer. She wants to nod. She wants to bury herself in my arms and let me soothe her. She needs me to assure her that she's not alone, not terrible. She needs, once again, forgiveness for her deceptions and manipulations and tedious lectures. She needs me to overlook her historical tendency to treat me like rubbish when she no longer requires me. In addition, of course, to making the first move so she can tell herself my comforting her was presumptuous and not what she desired. She will deny her affections for me as soon as she's strong enough to not need me.

Instead of offering all the comforts part of me wants to whisper into her hair, I'm silent until she's leaning into me. Her trembling weight presses against my body because she trusts me to make this right.

Not today. I've been used enough for the moment. I'm through eating her sins and earning only her disdain. And the truth is I can be as cruel and terrible as she has accused.

"Why don't you find someone less terrible you can relate to?"

I smell her tears as she walks away at a brisk human pace, away from me and the evidence of her terrible act.


	27. Choosing Filters

_A/N: Expanded Elena POV from 4.18, American Gothic_

* * *

**Choosing Filters**

Stefan and Damon silently agree it's Stefan's turn to talk some sense into me. I hate it when they they do that: look at each other and have entire unspoken conversations in a second. In silence, they're able to come to a consensus about what's best for me when they never agree on anything else. Did they presume to do this with Katherine too, human boys silently making decisions for a 400-year old vampire more than capable of looking out for herself?

"Listen," Stefan says. He leans across the table, like he's stopping himself from taking my hands in his. Smart because if he touched me, I'd have to use him as my message, and that would ruin everything. I don't want to hurt Stefan. That's the whole point. I'm done hurting them. "I was in the exact same situation you're in right now. My emotions were off. I wasn't me. And you refused to accept that. You didn't give up on me. You didn't stop until you pulled me back."

I resist rolling my eyes. It's incredible how he's able to make absolutely every single thing on the planet all about him. Newsflash, Stefan: not everything is your fault. I'm not a tedious burden to carry or something broken that needs to be fixed or another life to feel guilty about.

I'm fine.

And they aren't stopping. They aren't leaving me alone and allowing me to make my own choices. They will continue to only agree about what's in my best interest, and my presence, like Katherine's, will poison their love for each other.

I am not, and will never be, another Katherine Pierce.

The boys once again exchange looks, and I realize Damon sitting closest to me isn't a coincidence. He's subtly shifting his weight, and there's a good chance I'm about to get my neck snapped again and riding back to Mystic Falls in the trunk. He's not taking no for an answer, and neither is Stefan. What they refuse to see is that yes, I'm going back home, but not because they're making me. I'm going back because I choose to.

I sigh and move my partially-full mug to the edge of the table when I hear the waitress walking towards us. Before Damon can do anything, I take a page from his book and flash out of the booth. The waitress' neck breaks and the coffee pot shatters on the floor before either of them can react.

I get why this is Damon's favorite way to kill people. He rips out hearts too, but that's gross and messy. Snapping necks is... Wow. It feels... Good. This is different than killing Connor, which was terrifying and awful and had to be done before he staked me again. This time, without necessity stealing the show, I can focus on the sound, the feel of her bones cracking beneath my fingers. She's dead weight when she drops to the ground.

There's no scent of blood to bring out my fangs or redden my eyes. I'm not hungry. I want them to understand I'm not out of control. I'm making a choice. And I choose to kill this woman. Now. In this compelled town so none of us has to get dirty digging a grave. We can just leave her on the floor for Katherine to deal with and go home.

Damon jumps back. "Oh!" bursts out of him.

"Like I said," I say. "Consequences." They're both wide-eyed and not breathing. Good. I've got their attention. "That's one body you're responsible for. If you keep trying to fix me, there'll be a second, a twentieth, a hundredth. It's your choice."

Because we all deserve to make our own choices.

I walk deliberately, not hurrying or lingering, out of the diner and toward Damon's car. He can bring me back to Mystic Falls and think he's saving me. That's fine. I'm tired of driving. I ditched his car because I wanted something more comfortable, with power steering and cruise control and a working radio and an automatic transmission. A car that didn't smell like him so I could focus on Rebekah's annoying voice and her too-strong perfume and not feel anything else. I didn't even think about him being able to trace us.

It's harder to walk in Katherine's stilettos than I imagined. Not her actual shoes, which I really like. I shift my legs and turn my feet this way and that, admiring them. But it's exhausting to have to always make plans and figure things out and stay ahead of people intent on finding you.

I leave the passenger door open so they don't run around like idiots for the next hour looking for me. I grab Damon's flask of bourbon from the glove box, giving it a shake to confirm he refilled it since Rebekah and I drank his stash on the way here. I swallow, still coughing just a bit at the burn in my throat, and relax against leather that no longer smells like me and Damon having sex.

Shit.

There. Right there. With that thought. With countless thoughts, dozens of times every day.

I feel.

A twinge of sadness, of loss. I feel guilty because I ruined a perfectly sweet memory of us in this car the night before we left for the island. I spoiled it not just for me but for Damon too.

And Damon. Oh, Damon. I feel.

If I let it, I suspect it would all come back. All the feelings I don't want to feel. So I squeeze my eyes shut and bury my nose in the driver's seat and take deep breaths. I smell him, that scent that's soaked into the leather for decades. No amount of driving with the top down will ever cleanse the car of his wonderful Damony smell. I breathe the comforting scent of him into my lungs without the complications of having him right in front of me.

Stefan lied about the switch. Like he's lied about everything else. It's not as simple "On" or "Off." I assume it's like compulsion, that everyone reacts differently. But Stefan's whole, "It wasn't me. I was the Ripper" is a lie. And it's depressing how quickly the thrill of feeling but without feelings passed. I'm already used to sensations racing through my body. It's not overwhelming and exciting. It's just how things feel now.

Damon was right about this too because he's almost always right. For a while, I thought it was enough to simply feel and smell and touch and taste without feelings. But without feelings, there's nothing. Only a few days into it, and I already don't know how they did this for decades. This constant battle for bored, numb nothingness.

Elijah said I'd abandoned my emotions. He recognized it for the choice that it is, but it's a choice I have to keep making. Because I do care. I care about the same things I cared about before, just... differently. It's not a switch at all. It's Instagram, only for feelings. The picture is the same, but different filters make it look completely different. The mood of the picture changes. Sometimes it's blurred around the edges. Some details that aren't obvious with one filter are clear as day with another.

Yes, it's a filter, not a switch.

And regardless of the filter, Elijah is a fine-looking man. I've always thought that, but it was different this time. I wasn't in awe of him. I wasn't intimidated. I didn't feel like a little kid sitting at the grown-up's table when I was with him. But I admit I let out a breath I didn't realize I'd been holding when he said he liked my hair.

It'd been impulsive. The hair cut and color. I go back and forth between liking it and thinking it was a stupid and obvious thing to do. Rebekah and Katherine both hate it, although they could have said that just to be mean. Damon said he liked it, but he'd say he liked it if I shaved my head. Stefan didn't comment, which means either he didn't notice or doesn't like the new look, just like he never says but obviously doesn't like the new me.

Elijah said he liked my hair while stroking one of the red strands between his fingers in that deliberate way he has. It must look okay because no matter how much he cares for his memory of human Katerina, Elijah wouldn't say that if he honestly didn't think it looks good.

And Elijah's kiss. I'd never thought about kissing him only because it never occurred to me that kissing him would be an option. He didn't know he was kissing me, or he wouldn't have done it. I know Elijah doesn't casually do anything, especially not kiss people.

Since the night of the fire, Damon and I have had lots of sex, but he doesn't kiss me like he did. Before, he kissed me like he would happily spend a decade doing nothing else but kiss me. Like he needed to kiss me the way humans need to breathe. I miss his kisses. So I leaned into Elijah, wanting more. He's a very skilled kisser, and I wanted to be kissed like that for a long, long time. He stood so still in his perfect suit, but his lips were definitely not still. His kiss was passionate and deliberate and elegant. He's the one who stopped. Probably because public displays of affection aren't his style. But I could've kept on kissing him because it felt good to kiss without feelings.

I hear Damon and Stefan approaching, so I swallow once more from the flask. They climb into the car without speaking. Damon simply turns the key and screeches away from the curb, speeding down little streets back to the highway that will bring us home.

"Rebekah did break your stereo," I say.

"Terrific," Damon replies. "Nothing like listening to the wind blow. And you did a number on my transmission. Fucking female drivers."

"Here." I return his flask instead on commenting about his car. He shakes it with a snort. When I lean back into the seat, he takes a pull and offers the final swallow to Stefan. After Stefan empties it, he puts it back in the glove box.

"Let's all just..." Stefan begins, but his voice trails off.

"Listen to the wind blow?" I suggest.

"Yes," they answer in unison.

Stefan sounds defeated. Damon sounds angry, but I don't know about what. I've given him plenty of reasons lately, but today was pretty crappy, so it's probably a combination. And I don't ask him to clarify even though I'm curious. For miles, Damon drives, and we listen to the wind blow. Finally, Stefan tries, unsuccessfully, to stifle a yawn. Damon nudges him with his elbow and nods his head. Stefan sighs and shrugs before leaning his head back against the seat and settling in.

Another silent agreement. They're so careful to not touch each other unless they're fighting, but even their smallest gestures are full of significance. Like when Jeremy and I used to just look at each other out of the corner of our eyes and start giggling. That was before Mom and Dad died. Before all the lies and secrets and Jeremy getting high and me faking like I was fine when I really wasn't.

I keep thinking if I just say it out loud enough, it'll stop making me feel.

Jeremy is dead.

They're all dead. Mom. Dad. Jenna. Ric.

Mr. Forbes. Mr. and Mrs. Lockwood. Vicki. Grams. John. Isobel. The hybrids. Connor. The waitress.

Everyone is dead.

Technically, I'm dead.

Jeremy is dead.

My brother is dead.

I repeat it over and over inside my head, trying to take away the power of the words. I remind myself that Elijah spoke of the pain of losing a brother, and I didn't ask him which one. He's lost several, including Kol, who I helped kill. And Finn. And the boy whose name I can't remember, before their parents turned them into vampires. Elijah's lost both his parents too.

Everyone loses people they love. Death is part of life.

It's fine. I'm fine.

My brother is dead.

Jeremy is dead.

It's all right there, all those feelings I don't want to feel. I have to close my eyes and concentrate on the sound of air moving through Damon's lungs and the road under the tires and the wind around the car as we speed down the highway and the smell of Damon in the leather.

I take deep breaths and think about Damon silently keeping watch over Stefan's sleep, driving through the night even though he must be exhausted too. Damon will make sure we get home safely. He loves us so much even though we keep hurting him. Of all Stefan's lies, the ones he told me about Damon, how he was a monster and dangerous and unworthy of trust, are the most offensive.

I can't hurt him anymore. I don't want to hurt anyone, but especially not Damon. Not Stefan, either.

I've done the math: Damon and Stefan have spent far more time away from each other than together during their long lives. They spend a majority of their time together fighting, mostly just with words, but sometimes with fists and knives. There've been gut-stakings and threats. Both have stolen each other's rings and locked each other up. They've killed important people to send each other messages.

Shit. That never works. All it does is convince the person receiving the message to double his efforts. And I killed that waitress so they'd leave me alone. Only of course they won't. They'll see it as a sign to keep at it, to work harder. To save me before I hurt anyone else, not because they care about the people I kill, but because they think they're saving me. Shit. Shit. Shit.

I killed that woman. She's dead because I killed her, and it was for nothing.

I suck at being Katherine.

We found her, but not the cure. Rebekah didn't take it, so it's still out there. We know Elijah's working with Katherine to get it, and that's not bad news, but it's not especially helpful either. Katherine will want to give it to Klaus, and he wants me human again too. I could've had all the vervain-free people I wanted to eat and shopping and sex and fun, and instead I stole Damon's car and killed a woman and kissed Elijah and spoiled a perfectly nice trip to New York.

No wonder he's angry.

And I feel...

No. I don't. I don't feel. I don't care. Not about anyone or anything.

I don't care about Damon's feelings.

Stefan's breathing is deep and even when I quietly ask, because I really want to know even though I don't care, "Do you really want me to take the cure?"

"No," he says, shaking his head. "I'm not talking about this."

"You never want to talk about it. You and Stefan make decisions for me, and then people have to snap your neck so I can do what I need to do."

"Has it ever occurred to you that I've lived longer, and maybe I've learned some fucking lessons along the way?" he asks. "That maybe my telling you you're being stupid isn't me being dick so much as you actually being stupid?"

"You're the one who's being stupid."

"Thanks a lot," he snaps.

"You were going to save Katherine, no matter what. And she didn't need saving. All that happened was you and Stefan ended up vampires and hating each other. You're trying to save me. I don't need saving. And I don't want you and Stefan to hate each other again."

"Stefan and I will always hate each other," he says.

"That's a lie, and we both know it." I thump the back of his seat so it smacks against his thick skull. "Me being human again doesn't change anything. It doesn't bring anyone back. Human me will know Stefan's a liar. I won't want him."

"And me?" he quietly asks.

I lean forward and stroke his silky hair. I concentrate on how good the strands feel between my fingers, how fine and soft his hair is. I take deep breaths and push away the feelings so I only feel what I choose to feel: here, now, Damon's hair.

Damon can't love me like he loved Katherine. I won't be the thing that keeps him away from his brother. Not ever again.

He reaches up and covers my hand in his. After a second, he leans over and kisses my wrist. His lips are soft and warm against my skin. Damon's kisses feel better than good. They feel perfect.

"I don't want to be human," I say.

I close my eyes and focus on his skin against mine. I choose to feel only his skin.

"I don't want to take the cure, and I don't want to turn my emotions back on. Not anytime soon." I listen while he swallows. "I can't love you, Damon. Not like this."

* * *

_A/N: Thanks to CreepingMuse for being a fantastic reader with a nose for yearning. Thanks, too, to Trogdor19 for her chats and being wonderfully obsessive about character motivations. During the hiatus, if you want something cheerful to read, head on over to her newest story, Happily Ever After: Salvatore Style, a sweet and insightful look at life in the boarding house. Click "follow" too 'cause you never know when she's going to have something new to say._


	28. Echoes of Redemption

_A/N: For Trogdor19, who wanted Elijah naked for her birthday. We aim to please, although, because this is Elijah's POV, it's not nearly as light-hearted and smutty as I assume she would like it to be. Sorry about that, friend. But this is my interpretation of Katherine's "contact," which Elijah mentioned in 4.18, American Gothic. Many gracious thanks, always, to my fantastically talented beta, CreepingMuse, and thank you for all the feedback, gentle readers, which is indescribably encouraging and reminds me I'm not alone._

* * *

**Echoes of Redemption**

I don't typically attend to the Craiglist replies personally, but on rare occasions, my interest is piqued. There was something about the phraseology that made me believe Katerina authored this particular message. As I reread the words and considered my response, I thought it would be advantageous if I referred to her as Katherine Pierce, the woman she chose to become, rather than Katerina Petrova, the girl I once knew. But I can't. She is my Katerina, always and forever.

All those years ago, Katerina was my second chance to fulfill promises I'd made to Tatia before my mother brutally punished her because Tatia refused to choose one of us, and Klaus and I disobeyed our mother by continuing to fight for her anyway. First her blood turned us into vampires, and again it was used to curse Niklaus. I love my mother and have forgiven her many things, but I cannot forgive her for that treachery. I doubt I ever will.

Yet I lied when I told Katerina, when she was still human, I didn't believe in love. I told her that even as I'd fallen in love with her. She'd not hesitated to ask me why we would want to live if we ceased to believe in love. I wanted but didn't tell her I'd learned the hard way love is a vampire's greatest weakness, the surest path to an eternity of pain and misery.

Katerina is the reason I incurred my brother's wrath and spent five centuries torn from my family. I had absolutely no reasonable motivation to communicate with her. I have a network of people who keep me well informed, including my man in Mystic Falls. I seriously doubted she could tell me anything I didn't already know. But I was convinced it was her. After all this time, my Katerina wanted to speak with me. She wasn't hiding or running or terrified of me, and that was enough to convince me to designate the time and place for our meeting.

She was stealthy enough to catch me unaware three hours before our agreed upon rendezvous.

In my defense, she's quite skilled at clandestine operations, and I was distracted. I was meandering around the Tate Modern at a leisurely pace when I spied the massive canvas, abstract in style, the oils thick and glossy and reaching out of the painting towards the viewer. Vast and ominous layers of blacks and grays threaten a riot of colors that spill over the canvas and onto the mat. Or perhaps it's the complex, vibrant hues beating back the darkness. Impossible to tell for sure, which undoubtedly is the point.

I was standing quite still, studying my brother's painting, when she whispered in my ear, "Do you think he compelled the curator?"

I didn't react to her sudden appearance. Nor did I dignify her accusation with a response. For someone she's been so successful to avoid for centuries, she doesn't know my brother at all. Niklaus is not above compelling paintings off museum walls, but he would never stoop so low as to compel one of his pieces into a museum. He may live by his own rules, but he's always been serious and passionate about his art. If it's hanging here, he earned the privilege through proper and legitimate channels.

She obviously dressed for me, not at all like the recent reports and photographs of Katherine Pierce. Her appearance surely had been carefully calculated for maximum effect, either as an offensive weapon to use against me or defensive shield because she anticipated an attack. She wore an A-line dress with a full skirt that fell below her knees. Delicate heels made her several inches taller and showed off perfectly pedicured toes and smooth olive skinned legs. Her hair style reminded me of my human Katerina, the sides intricately braided like a crown, her curls left long and loose over her shoulders.

"What do you require of me, Katerina?"

"So dour," she sulked. "That's what I get for reaching out to you?"

She fidgeted and tossed her hair as if she were disappointed and pouting, but the movements were well practiced and perfectly executed. She ensured I was aware of her many physical charms from the best possible angles. She was prepared for battle, she looked stunningly beautiful, and she knew it.

I didn't respond, merely continued studying Klaus' painting. Despite our differences, months after I thought he'd been killed, I continue to be overwhelmed with relief that he's not gone.

"Fine," Katerina finally said after several awkward minutes of silence. "I believe we can be..." Katerina stepped closer to the painting, narrowing her eyes as she examined it. "Mutually beneficial."

"You want me to trust you?" I couldn't help but ruefully laugh. "It's a common mistake, Katerina. Not one I intend to repeat."

"A lot's changed, Elijah," she said.

"Such as?"

"Everything," she simply stated before turning and facing me at last. "Can we get out of here? I don't want eavesdroppers, and Klaus' painting sucks."

"I rather like it," I said. "I've decided it's hopeful."

"I admire your optimism." She smiled and winked. "That's exactly why I'm offering to tell you what I know. My place or yours?"

I certainly had no intention of asking my hired man, who technically owns the London house, to invite Katerina in, so I accompanied her to her hotel – the Mandarin Oriental by Hyde Park. Katerina didn't invite me to her room right away. We had drinks in a quiet corner of the bar and compelled the host to not seat anyone near us. She ordered champagne and raised her glass to me before taking a demure sip.

"What you do want, Katherine?" I finally asked again.

"It's interesting that your brother calls me Katerina when he intends to insult me, and you call me Katherine for the same effect. The pleasant portion of our meeting doesn't have to be over yet."

I allowed the warm and appealing scent of my cognac to soothe me while I briefly closed my eyes in frustration at her coquettish games.

"What would you prefer to be called?" I calmly asked.

"Call me whatever you want," she said. The toe of her shoe gently moved against my leg.

"Tell me what you know," I said.

I did not give her the satisfaction of moving my leg away from her foot. But as she spoke of the barrage of developments in Mystic Falls since the night I left, her toe traced lazy circles on my calf, moving ever so subtly higher as she sipped her drink.

"To ensure I understand," I finally said when her story was complete, as if what she said were new to me. "There is a suspicious human professor who knows a great deal about the Five. He is working with the young Bennett witch. He also summoned a hunter to Mystic Falls, who was killed by Elena Gilbert, who is now sired to Damon Salvatore."

I paused and waited for her to comment on either unlikely scenario, a true vampire sire-bond, born only out of intense love for one's maker, or a newborn vampire eliminating a hunter. She didn't appear jealous or impressed by Elena, merely presented a flawlessly bored facade I didn't believe. Despite her many protests to the contrary, she must loathe Elena Gilbert and the Salvatores' affections for her.

Katerina refilled my glass and gestured for me to continue my recitation of the facts.

"Klaus gave the Salvatores one of his hybrids for Jeremy Gilbert to kill," I said. "Thus activating him and ending the curse for Elena. The Salvatores are intent on finding the cure and using it on Elena. Klaus is equally motivated to return Elena's humanity because he slaughtered his remaining hybrids after Tyler Lockwood un-sired them and mutinied, but he also wants to ensure said cure isn't used against him. Kol has entered the fray because, after spending much of his immortal life with witches, he's terrified of Silas and wants to prevent his awakening at all costs."

"A succinct summary," she replied. "Never a dull moment in Mystic Falls."

"Indeed," I agreed. "How did you procure this information?"

"I have my sources," Katerina said.

"Sources?"

"Reliable ones," she quickly added, making it quite clear that was all she would give me. But then she smiled at me. "But I doubt I've told you anything you didn't already know. I'll show you mine if you show me yours?"

"Where is Rebekah?" I asked instead of answering. I wouldn't waste effort discovering who Katerina's informants are, as it was obvious she wasn't going to divulge their identity, and I certainly wasn't revealing mine either. But I was curious to see how good her sources are, or how much she was willing to share with me.

"In Mystic Falls. She moved out of Klaus' and has her own place."

"How is she involved?"

Katerina shrugged her shoulders. "I don't know that she is."

"If Klaus and Stefan are searching for the cure, I assure you my sister is as well," I said.

Katerina shrugged again and swallowed the last of her drink. I couldn't tell if she honestly didn't know what Rebekah's involvement was, or if she was lying to me. She and Rebekah had never gotten along. My leaving because of her surely hadn't improved Rebekah's sentiments, and both Klaus and Rebekah share legitimate affection for Stefan, Katerina's favorite of the Salvatores.

"You know her better than I do, thank goodness," Katerina said. "I'll take your word on that. But you see why time is of the essence: we have rather determined competition."

"Why do you require my assistance? While I have no doubt regarding your ability to get whatever it is you want." She smiled and batted her lashes at me. "Why do you want to locate the cure, and why do you need me after you've done so?"

"I intend to use it as payment."

"To whom, and for what?"

"Oh come on," she said. "Let's not insult each other. You've already figured out my end-game. It's not particularly abstruse."

"I want to hear you say it."

She sighed and shifted in her seat. She stared at me steadily, and I stared back. She looked away first.

"Fine," she finally said, admitting defeat. "I want to get it before anyone else because Klaus wants it. I don't need your help finding it. What I do need is someone Klaus trusts to broker a deal: the cure in exchange for my freedom and his assurance he'll stop hunting me and he won't use it on me. I want his word that he'll leave me alone."

I assumed that was indeed her goal, to use me to negotiate on her behalf with my brother. While I appreciated her moment of frankness, what I didn't know was why. Was I a mere necessity? The lesser of evils and more easily manipulated? I wasn't so foolish as to believe she actually trusted me, but perhaps her coming to me now was an attempt to atone for her betrayal all those years ago?

"You do realize," I point out. "That Klaus cares not which Petrova doppelganger is human? In doing this, you're condemning Elena to a life of servitude."

Katerina rolled her eyes and scoffed. "Please tell me you haven't fallen for poor, innocent Elena, like everyone else." She studied me for a moment before swallowing the rest of her wine and refilling the glass. "Of course you have. Look, she wants to take it anyway. I don't. So why not let her? Work out an arrangement with Klaus for her too, if you want. I don't care."

Of course she doesn't care. Katherine Pierce cares for no one and nothing but herself. She is ready and willing to sacrifice anyone and anything to get what she wants. She honestly doesn't care what happens to Elena when she is no longer vampire, so long as Katherine is secure that Klaus will keep his end of the bargain.

This was not my Katerina sitting before me, the girl who reminded me that living without love wasn't living at all. This was Katherine. If I desired companionship as an intellectual exercise with a manipulative, scheming, bitch, there were others to choose from. I didn't need to match wits with the woman who looks like the girl I love. I had no intention of leaving myself vulnerable to her again.

I didn't reply, merely opened my wallet and pulled out cash to cover the cost of our drinks.

"Wait, Elijah." She took my hand in both of hers. "Please."

Her voice, for the first time since the museum, was not full of confidence. She sounded scared and desperate, and I didn't know if it was an act, or if she was truly frightened. I hated that I never knew what to believe, that I was forced to second-guess every single thing she did and said.

Did Katerina herself even know when she was lying or when she was telling the truth?

"Elijah, you know Klaus better than anyone. He will find a way to get it, and you're the only one who can guarantee Elena doesn't live the rest of her life in a gilded cage as a blood bag and baby maker. Stefan and Damon can't save her from that, although they're stupid enough to try. All they'll get is quick death, if they're lucky, and then Elena will be alone. Or, and you know this is more than possible, Klaus will keep them and hurt them as a way to control her. You're the only one Klaus respects enough to listen to and fears enough to not double-cross on the back-end. You're the only one who can protect us both."

I removed my hand from hers. I tried to save Katerina, just as I tried to save Elena after her and Tatia before her. I failed every time.

"I attempted to protect you once before, Katerina. Why would I be foolish and try again?"

"I was young and stupid and scared," she whispered. "I made a terrible mistake." She shook her head and cleared her throat. "Why? Why did you want me to remain human when you were already immortal? Why didn't you simply tell me the truth and feed me your blood before the sacrifice?"

"Because I wanted to give you the opportunity to live a normal life, Katerina, if that's what you wanted, the same as I wanted for Elena. I'd given my word to Klaus, but I wanted you to come back a human. I wanted to give you the choice."

No one should be turned into a vampire without their consent. It should be a choice, not made under duress or fear or desperation. It should not be brutal like my father running his sword through my chest. Nor should it be lonely and terrified, as Katerina was the night she hung herself. It should always be done with gentleness and for love.

It was my turn to clear my throat. How did she not see that I loved her? That I love her still, always and forever?

I watched as she rapidly blinked, as if discouraging tears, but I couldn't smell them and I didn't trust that she meant what she said.

"Katerina, what could have maybe been five hundred years ago means nothing to me. This conversation is a waste of time."

"Elijah, please," she whispered. "All I'm asking is that you try to do what you promised me all those years ago and protect me."

"Why?"

"I want my life to be my own." She suddenly looked very young and very small. "I want to make choices based on motivations other than how to survive. I want to live and love as I please."

I sat back and studied her. She said she wanted to live and love as she chose. She said the words I most wanted to hear, the only words that could convince me to assist her. This is Katherine Pierce, an expert manipulator, liar, and thief. A survivor. She adapts to survive, always, and I could merely be part of her strategy. I know this. I reminded myself of all the times she's told people what they needed to hear so she got what she wanted.

But part of me dared to hope. That piece of myself I kept buried away, where it couldn't hurt me, reacted to her the same way it did when I first saw her. I wanted to pull her into my arms and whisper into her hair and never let her go. Yes, I could save her this time. But she would save me as well. We could save each other.

God, I wanted to believe her. Believe in her.

She nodded towards the piano player tucked away in the far corner. "Dance with me?" she quietly asked.

"It's not that type of establishment," I pointed out. "The musician is to add to the ambiance, not for dancing." She shrugged again, the movement showing off delicate collar bones and the perfect cut of cap sleeves on her dress.

"Ask me anyway," she said. "Because back when your musicians played for dancing, I was spoken for, and women didn't presume to do the asking. Maybe I've been waiting a long, long time for you to ask me to dance."

I'd admired Katerina when she was brought to my brother as a birthday gift. I'd lived for centuries at that point, but when I first saw her over five hundred years ago, I couldn't help but see my lost Tatia. It was indeed magic that had created the creature who nervously stood before me with her heavily accented English, and I leaned infinitesimally closer to smell her. Even without her magical blood, she was no ordinary girl. Katerina resurrected the boy I'd long since forsaken, the love and hope that once filled him.

But despite being the eldest, I'd given Niklaus my word to do everything in my power to aid him in breaking our mother's curse, including sacrificing the doppelganger. I was prepared to spare her life, yes, but I recognized and respected Klaus' prior claim.

Klaus was not enchanted by Katerina, as I was. Or perhaps, knowing what had to be done, he hid his feelings better than I. To him, she was a means to an end. And though she was a poor girl, alone, far from home, and at the mercy of strangers, she was aware of his indifference, and she had the audacity to want more. She didn't merely look like Tatia; she shared her fire. Her passion.

Elena has it too, that passion. For Tatia, it was focused solely on her son. She loved him above all else, just as Elena values her family, both her blooded kin and the people she's chosen to call family, more than she values her own life. Katerina's fire manifests itself differently. Perhaps out of necessity, but she has always seen to her own needs first.

I know this. But I wanted give her another chance, just as I wanted her to give me another chance to prove that yes, I could save her. I could keep her safe. She doesn't have to run. She doesn't have to be alone and afraid. We can have each other.

In that moment, I was a boy again who wanted, more than anything, to ask the girl to dance.

Against my better judgment, I stood and offered her my hand. She moved gracefully in my arms, and when I spun her, her skirt twirled beautifully, the soft fabric coming to rest against my slacks. The humans in the bar were enthralled, the men smiling and the women not subtle about wanting their companions to make similar spectacles in the name of love.

But even as she felt as perfect against me as I once imagined, I acknowledged the very real possibility that she was manipulating me. Katherine Pierce, most likely, was wielding her greatest weapon, herself, and like so many before me, I couldn't stop myself from falling for it.

We danced through two songs when she stepped close, forsaking the polite distance I'd left between us. She pressed herself against me from knee to chest and whispered, "Let's go upstairs."

I despise hotels. No matter how expensive the suite, they're never sufficiently cleaned to remove various human scents. There are sounds leaking from the floors above and below, the elevator whirring, water moving in pipes. I vastly prefer my own homes, where there is only the human, who technically owns the residence and keeps up with tedious maintenance, and me. I learned long ago the value in delegating menial tasks. But my distaste wasn't enough to prevent me from nodding my agreement, from once more offering her my arm. We left the bar to a smattering of applause and walked across the lobby toward the elevator.

"The usual," she said to the clerk behind the desk, compelling him. "And the drinks we had at the bar."

"Of course, Miss Pierce," he said. "Right away."

"Hungry?" she asked me.

I shook my head, not wanting to divulge the fact that I no longer drink directly from humans if I can possibly avoid it. Yes, blood tastes better warm and fresh from the source, but there's an inescapable intimacy to drinking from the vein. After over a thousand years, I've grown weary of such complications and am grateful for the ease of procuring blood bags.

"You're not the only one with reliable sources, you know," she told me once we were in the suite and she handed me a blood bag from the refrigerator. Her hand lingered on my wrist. "I know some of your secrets too."

There was a knock on the door, and I didn't linger in the suite and watch her feed from the boy who brought another high hat with chilled champagne and the remainder of the bottle of cognac I was drinking at the bar. I stepped out onto the balcony overlooking Hyde Park. Katerina had the penthouse, of course, and the height muffled the sound of traffic. When she joined me outside some time later, she held out a drink to me.

"Lovely view," I said, staring at her. She was barefoot and without jewelry except the delicate lapis lazuli daylight bracelet around her wrist. She'd washed the makeup from her face and removed the braid from her hair. Standing before me, her curls loose and damp around her face, she looked every bit the human girl I met so long ago, not the infamous vampire who'd evaded my brother at the expense of others.

She'd never been so lovely.

"I enjoy my creature comforts," she said without apology, swallowing half the champagne in her glass.

"I wasn't speaking of the room."

When she smiled, she looked even more like the Katerina I fell in love with. She set down her drink, gently removed mine from my hand and placed it on the table. Once more she pressed herself against me. While her hair tickled my nose, she loosened my tie and unbuttoned the top button of my shirt.

"I've never seen you not properly dressed," she quietly admitted as she unbuttoned a second button. She tugged until the tie unknotted, but she left it hanging loosely around my neck. "Do you always wear a suit?"

"No," I said, placing my hands on top of hers to still them. "In fact, I sleep nude." I moved her chin with my thumb, making her look at me. "What game are you playing, Katerina?" I whispered. I know she takes vervain so I couldn't compel her, and I was relieved I didn't have to make that choice myself because I didn't want to control her, but I was desperate for the truth.

"No games, Elijah."

"I want to believe you."

I am not as immune to her as I wish I could be. I am not heartless or without feeling. I wanted her. I wanted her in every sense of the word. As a man wants the woman he loves. The woman he's loved for so long he's long forgotten how to live without loving her.

I want her. It's as simple and as complicated as that.

"Then do," she said. She stood on tiptoe and pressed her lips against mine.

Over five centuries after we met, and she finally kissed me. She was not offering a chaste kiss, but slipped her tongue into my mouth and pressed even more closely against me.

She was the one who started moving back towards the door, her lips still on mine, her hands on my chest. When we got to the room, she turned and looked at me over her shoulder, asking without words for me to unzip her dress. I gathered her hair in one hand, the thick curls escaping so I had to gather them again, brushing my fingers against her neck while she shivered.

"Please," she whispered. I slowly pulled down the zipper.

She was bare beneath it.

She took her time undressing me. Kissing and licking as she exposed skin. It wasn't until we'd made it to the bed that her fangs revealed themselves, her kisses nicking my lips and tongue. She lapped at the droplets of blood until I had other plans for my mouth, moving down, across stretches of flawless skin, and settled between her legs.

Even as I tasted her sweetness, even as my fingers and lips played her like a finely tuned instrument until she was writhing and begging and pulling my hair with enough force to hurt, part of me wondered if I was making a mistake. But I couldn't stop.

I didn't want to stop, even if it was a lie. Even if I was giving her the power to hurt me as no one else ever could. In that moment, I didn't care about the consequences.

I've wanted her from the first moment I laid eyes on her. And last night, finally, I had her. And she was exquisite, right up until the moment I fell asleep just as the sky was beginning to turn pink. When I closed my eyes, she was tucked against my side, her head resting on my shoulder and her legs entwined with mine.

And then I awoke to the sound of the shower running in the next room. While not particularly surprising, it's nevertheless disappointing to realize I'm alone in the too-soft hotel bed before I opened my eyes. I'd hoped she wouldn't be so quick to rise and shower alone. Yet here I am, lying in mussed sheets, and the bathroom door is closed. The gesture could be polite, given I was sleeping when she vacated the bed. But there are extensive and disparate explanations for her early departure, politeness being only one of many.

Five hundred years ago, protecting Katerina was my second chance. My redemption. Now she's the one asking for a second chance, and despite allowing her seduction, relishing it even, I do not know if she's using me as Klaus wanted to use her. For all my years on this earth, I am at her mercy. And we both know it.

It's quite possible I am a disposable means to an end. She may not love me. She may not care for me at all. But for the first time since she took matters into her own hands and ended her human life, I dare to hope my Katerina hasn't stopped believing in love.


	29. Tomorrow Comes Too Soon

_A/N: Expanded Damon POV from Pictures of You (4.19)_

* * *

**Tomorrow Comes Too Soon**

"Damon," Stefan quietly says as he sinks into one of the sofas. He leans forward and rests his head in his hands. "I lied."

No shit, Sherlock.

There'd been that awkward moment by the car when we both reached for her, but I demurred and let him carry her inside. He was so gentle with her as he placed her in the cell, thank goodness. Jackass has a tendency to throw me unceremoniously onto the floor. But then neither of us spoke as we walked upstairs, leaving the door to the basement open even though Stefan injected her with enough vervain to guarantee she's out for at least twelve hours. Probably more.

Goddammit. She's been a vampire for all of three seconds. How did things get this fucked up?

_Damon, help me. _

She was in my arms on the ground, blinded from the pain. Broken bones, the smell of her blood thick in the air. She cried and writhed and begged as Bonnie burst the blood vessels in her brain.

_Please._

She was so scared. God, she was terrified. And instead of killing Bonnie for hurting her, never mind that her death means the end of Silas' plan to unleash hell on earth, I saw an opportunity to bring Elena back. I am such a dick for even considering this because I know she feels, no matter how determined she is to hide it. Even switched off, she is the most infuriatingly stubborn girl who ever breathed, and she had to be a bitch until she feared for her life.

Yes, we've vertained and locked up friends and family hell-bent on destruction before. Our basement cell has had more guests than a fucking Holiday Inn Express. She's helped me do this exact thing to Stefan, and she's helped Stefan do it to me. But this isn't me or Stefan or Ric with a psychotic alter-ego or Liz ready to kill us all or a daggered Original. This is Elena.

We're calmly discussing torturing her humanity back into her so she can feel all the pain and misery she's choosing to ignore, and Stefan thinks now is the time to point out that he lies?

Fan-fucking-tastic.

I can't deal with his melodramatic bullshit right now, so I pretend I don't hear him and strike a match and light the waiting kindling in the fireplace before heading to the bar and pouring drinks.

"Scotch?" I ask, pouring before he can answer because I know he prefers it to bourbon. "I picked up a case of Macallan for you."

How fitting on prom night to drink a scotch older than most of the people we spent our evening with. I hand him the glass, and he puts it to his nose and sighs appreciatively.

Turning back to the bar, I poke around the various options, looking for the bottle I want for myself. Nothing smooth. Not tonight. I want it to fucking burn. Except we don't have anything that fits that description because I buy the booze and I'm a snob. Where's Ric's cheap-ass shit when I need it? Oh yeah. I finished his last bottle sitting by his grave, futilely justifying myself to a rock.

"Damon," Stefan says again. "I lied."

"Gonna have to narrow that down, brother," I reply as I settle onto the other sofa with my own drink.

He nods. "Yeah." He takes a long, slow swallow. "I mean about Silas in the woods. He didn't..." Stefan looks away from me and stares intently into the fire that's still just getting started. There aren't flames to study yet, not really. No warmth radiating out. Just some little twigs trying to get the thing going. "What I mean to say is that he..." Stefan clears his throat.

Jesus fucking Christ. I know he didn't lure Stefan into the woods pretending to be me with a Silas-sighting before covertly gut-staking him. We don't even know what the hell Silas looks like. My brother is an excellent liar most of the time, but that one was piss-poor by anyone's standards, which is why I gave him an even more pathetic answer in return. Yeah, Stef, we both got duped and feel really shitty.

"He told you the truth," I finally offer so he'll stop squirming and torturing himself. There's going to be plenty of that to go around in the days to come. "He looked like me and calmly pointed out the one thing you wish to god wasn't true, only maybe it is."

_What you have is a one-night stand that was probably the result of the sire-bond._

That's the bitch of it, actually. The truth is always so much worse than all the lies put together. I was trying to breathe because being sucker punched with the ugly reality that she may never have loved me is as painful as it fucking gets, and then the fucker gut-staked me. The whole sticks-and-stones theory is blown to shit because at the time it was impossible to distinguish which hurt more, but my body healed quickly. The possibility that it wasn't real? Not only was that not a fucking revelation, but I still feel it, right here in my chest. A tight, terrible sensation, like my heart is being squeezed and ripped out and set on fire and freezing, all at the same time.

"And after he staked you," I continue. "I bet you didn't realize it wasn't me right away because there've been plenty of times I threw the shitty truth in your face and then stabbed you. It's kind of our thing."

Stefan takes another too slow drink. "Something like that," he says.

"Yep," I agree.

"So your chat with him was slightly less funny than talking about my hair?"

I shrug. "Everything's less funny than your hair. It's fucking hysterical."

Stefan cracks a smile and raises his glass to me. "Yeah."

"You know what's not even a little bit funny?" I say. "I ruined another fucking shirt." I stick two fingers through the blood stained hole.

"If you shopped off the rack once in a while, losing one wouldn't be so traumatic."

"Not everyone wants to be the poster boy for Old Navy," I snap back.

Stefan smiles and shrugs. "Then don't bitch about your wardrobe. You're worse than Caroline."

I refuse to wear shitty, ill-fitting clothes because someone might stab me, and no one is as bad as Caroline.

Admittedly, Elena stealing her dress was a low blow, but the color would've been all wrong for her. It looked great on Elena, and Caroline managed to show up looking quite sensational, which she well knew. When she gave me the once-over, it wasn't personal. Caroline judges everyone's attire when she first sees them. And yeah, maybe I preened a little bit for her benefit because I know I look good in a tux. I stuck my hands in my pockets on the pretense of pulling out the flask, but really I was making sure she checked out my ass, which she did. I'm interpreting her lack of commentary as the closest I'll get to Caroline Forbes complimenting me.

I spent entirely too long deciding which one to wear, as if the tux I chose would somehow matter to Elena, who wouldn't recognize the difference between a rental and a fitted Tom Ford or Armani. And then I spent even longer deciding which shirt, obsessing over the subtle distinctions in the fabrics and cuffs and collars and buttons. And then there were the ties. I don't even own that many ties, and I still took over an hour, tying each one and staring as I turned my head this way and that, looking at them from all possible angles.

Fuck. I'm pathetic. It's a fucking black tuxedo I wore to a fucking prom. And not only did I go to the prom, but then I didn't even dance with anyone.

I almost asked Caroline to dance with me. It was on the tip of my tongue as we stood there, the best dressed people at the fucking thing. We both enjoy dancing and are actually good at it. Neither of us could dance with the person we wanted to, so why not? Why the fuck not bask and be envied and enjoy ourselves, if only for a song?

I wanted to. I wanted to forget, just for a minute, how miserable I was. I wanted to pretend I wasn't pathetic. Except I figured she'd say no anyway, and even though I don't even like Caroline Forbes, I just...

I couldn't hear her tell me no. So I didn't ask. I offered her a drink instead.

I am a fucking cliché because like any other 17-year old girl, I put all my hopes and dreams into a single evening that could never live up to my unrealistic expectations. It doesn't matter that no one died tonight, which is nothing short of miraculous at a Mystic Falls event because I shared my date with my brother, and she didn't want to be there with either one of us.

Christ. I hate myself.

"Refill?" Stefan asks.

I look down and realize my glass is empty. "Yeah," I say. "Thanks."

"Are you mad at me?" Stefan asks as he hands me my drink and settles back into the sofa.

"Gonna have to narrow that down too," I say.

He nods. "It's just that..." He sighs and takes such a long sip that it's like he's marinating his lips. "Earlier, at the dance..." He takes another sip.

Jesus. I hate it when he gets like this. Spit it out already. Say it. Fucking purge.

"I know you were listening," he finally says. "When I danced with Elena. And you looked..."

"Devastatingly handsome?" I offer.

"Devastated," he says, looking at me at last. Now that he is, I wish he wouldn't. His eyes, the color of a stormy sea, are full of sadness and regret and maybe even pity and fuck him if he thinks he gets to pity me because I don't need it. Not from him or anyone else.

I swallow my drink in a single gulp and stand up so he'll stop fucking looking at me. But even with my back to him as I lean against the mantle, gazing into the now crackling fire, feeling fingers of heat as the flames warm my legs, I know he's staring at me. All worried and anxious and guilty. It's enough to make me want to stab him with something wooden before running away.

I hate this shit.

"You were just following Plan A," I say in a voice that's too tight to be convincing. I swallow and clear my throat. "We all agreed tonight was about trying to make her feel."

The photo montage was sentimental and manipulative as all shit, which it was supposed to be. It's prom. They're supposed to cry and hug people they can't stand and take too many pictures and vow to remember this night for always. It's the gloriest of glory days. And well done, Caroline, because the pictorial tribute wasn't all about her and I know that really had to chap her ass. It was a memorial to Elena's humanity. That and all the dead kids who didn't live long enough to make it to the dance, which is seriously messed up and depressing as all hell.

After their dance, when I watched while Stefan did his best to remind her how much she loved him, I leaned against the trees and watched the screens flash smiling faces that no longer exist. I know it's selfish and stupid, but all I saw was the absence of me. I told myself it wasn't because I didn't matter. I reminded myself that I hate having my picture taken, that there are only a handful of photos of me in existence, and none from this decade. I told myself it's dangerous for someone who doesn't age to be photographed, especially in the digital age. I blamed Caroline because she hates me and wouldn't have included pictures of me even if they existed, which they don't.

I told myself that, but I wasn't very convincing as photos of Elena and Stefan kept popping up, larger than life among the trees.

The truth is the only things I'm good at are fucking and killing, and no one except seriously sick bastards wants to snap photos of that shit. That, and no one cares enough to want to take my picture.

My father didn't even have a likeness of me. The one photograph from my human life belonged to Stefan. It was taken at his request, days before I left with the Army of Northern Virginia. I told him he didn't need a picture to remember me because the war would be over quickly. I told him I'd be home before he had a chance to miss me. He'd nodded and quietly said, "What if it doesn't take long for something terrible to happen?"

Of course I agreed. That was back when I didn't deny my little brother anything. I wore my brand new uniform, before it was worn and muddy and full of holes and tears. Stefan wore his best suit. We were instructed to stand perfectly still, but at the last moment, I impulsively reached around and pulled him closer to me, squeezing his shoulder too tightly instead of admitting I was terrified too. I was afraid I wouldn't come home to him. I didn't want to just stiffly stand there next to him like we were strangers. If I died, I wanted the only picture of me to show how much I loved him.

My hand ended up all blurry and fucked up the picture, but Stefan smiled when he saw it and refused to have it retaken.

I don't even know if he still has it.

"You put forth a valiant effort," I tell Stefan with a smile that I hope doesn't look too fake. "I think I fell in love with you."

Silas as Stefan was right. Any feeling right now would be great. Her remembering how much she loved Stefan means we don't have to do what I think we're going to have to do. Her falling in love with Stefan tonight would be a total fucking victory if it saves her from what we're planning on trying tomorrow since this whole nice-guy thing is failing so spectacularly.

"I mean it," he says. "Damon, I don't want to keep doing this. After we get everything worked out, I'm going to leave. I don't want to come between you. I can't be a part of her life."

"I said that too," I remind him. "Yet here I am."

"You couldn't leave. Not when she was just turned and there was a hunter in town."

"And we've enjoyed so much peace and tranquility in the last two years," I quietly say. "I'm sure, once this Silas thing is taken care of, never mind we don't know how to kill him except with the one dose of the cure we don't have and intend to use on Elena, everything will be just fine and fucking dandy."

I sigh before returning to the bar and refreshing both of our drinks.

"I didn't mean..." he begins. "Tonight, when we were dancing..."

"Yeah," I interrupt.

"I'm not..." He sighs. "I don't..."

"You did exactly what you were supposed to do, Stef."

I know she's lying when she says she doesn't care. If the switch were as simple as we all pretend it is, if an "off" vampire didn't care about anything at all, she would simply lay down and slowly desiccate. Elena is the opposite of indifferent. She's making Caroline pay for every snide, bitchy thing she's ever done. She's pissed as all hell at me and Stefan for trying to make her take the cure. She's struggling to not feel crippled by the pain of Jeremy's death. She's fighting all the time to keep her switch exactly where it is.

Elena was at that fucking prom tonight because she wanted to be, even if she didn't want to be there with me. So fucking what. She's never gone to a dance with me by choice. I bought that stupid fucking corsage and forced it on her wrist because I wanted to, goddammit. I want to be her date, and I don't care if that makes me _that_ creepy guy who's too old to be at the fucking prom. I want her to look so happy when she's dancing with me that someone takes a picture of us.

I spent too long picking out my clothes, and then I didn't even ask her to dance. I glibly threw the word "boyfriend" at her and confiscated her flask and kept her from falling face-first onto the concrete while Stefan vervained her. That's the extent of my efforts to remind her that maybe deep down she loves me because once, just fucking once, I want to be enough for her, and I haven't pulled out all the stops the way Stefan did tonight because I'm too fucking terrified that I'm not.


	30. Ladder To the Stars

_A/N: Expanded Stefan POV from Pictures of You (4.19). This picks up right where the previous chapter, Tomorrow Comes Too Soon (Damon's POV), leaves off. Thanks, always, to CreepingMuse. There really aren't enough ways to describe her general awesomeness, so you should check out her new Prom One-Shot, Yearbook._

* * *

**Ladder To the Stars**

"Damon, I don't want to keep doing this. After we get everything worked out, I'm going to leave. I don't want to be a part of her life."

Saying those words aloud feels worse than being staked to a tree, and there's no way he won't call my bullshit. He has to know it's not that I don't want to be with her. She doesn't want me.

"I said that too," he says with a sigh. "Yet here I am."

The night she admitted she didn't want to choose between us, we drove off with Klaus in a coffin and dared to imagine a future that wasn't defined by tragedy and strife. We smiled and laughed and were so bold as to shout "We won!" into the night. I was hopeful enough to promise I would give them a fair chance at happiness if she chose him. I was fairly certain she wouldn't, which is why I offered the deal. But Damon agreed anyway. That night, the night she died, we promised to stop fighting. To allow her to choose.

It's the closest I've come to telling Damon I love him since we were human.

"You couldn't leave," I insist. "Not when she was just turned and the Council was onto us and there was a hunter in Mystic Falls."

_Damon, help me._

I was standing right there too, when Bonnie put Elena on the ground, when she was broken and bleeding and crying. But she asked for Damon, not me. Elena's always gone to Damon when she needs help. Of course he didn't leave her after he promised me he would. I should never have asked him to.

"And we've enjoyed so much peace and tranquility in the last two years," he quietly says with a rueful smile.

They did, actually. Those months I was gone when he and Alaric took care of Elena and Jeremy. Caroline told me. She meant it as an accusation, how attentive he was last summer. But why didn't someone take a picture of Damon in the kitchen wearing Mrs. Gilbert's flowered apron, or Elena laughing as she sprayed him in the face when they washed the cars, or crashed on the couch playing video games with Jeremy? There should've been pictures of Damon tonight even though he doesn't go to school. The entire thing was supposed to remind Elena how much people love her, and he's been with her more than I have. But there aren't pictures of him. Just me and Elena at doomed decade dances and parties where people died.

"I'm sure, once this Silas thing is taken care of, never mind we don't know how to kill him except with the one dose of the cure we don't have and intend to use on Elena, everything will be just fine and fucking dandy."

When he says it like that, I realize how stupid I sound. There will always be a reason why not to leave. I'll never ride off into the sunset, and we both know it. History will continue to tragically repeat itself. This is Mystic Falls.

"I didn't mean..." I begin, stalling out before I say anything. "Tonight, when we were dancing..."

I want to kick myself for all the times I didn't dance with her, or danced with her begrudgingly, or just to make Damon jealous. I should've enjoyed every second of a smiling Elena who loved me and wanted to twirl and press herself against me and rest her head on my shoulder and sway in my arms to our own rhythm. Now that she's gone, I know exactly what I'm missing.

Damon watched us, only he didn't see all the things our dance wasn't. I could tell by the look on his face he just saw us dancing when he wanted, more than anything, to ask her to dance with him.

"Yeah," he interrupts, trying to save me the discomfort of explaining that yes, I did everything I could to bring her back, and she wasn't at all affected. In fact, she seemed bored by my big effort to seduce her.

"I'm not..."

Even if Caroline is right and one day I find myself in love with someone else, I can't lie and say I'm not in love with her now. He deserves better than me spouting off crap we both know isn't true.

"I don't..."

I don't want to hurt him anymore. I don't want to stand in the way, but I can't bear to watch them be happy together. I just can't.

"You did exactly what you were supposed to do," he assures me, hearing, as always, the things I want to say but don't.

"Yeah," I say, taking a long sip of my drink. "Okay."

That's the thing about Damon. He nonchalantly bought a case of my favorite scotch and had it waiting for me tonight. I don't buy it very often because it seems excessive to drink something this expensive on a regular basis. But Damon did because either tonight was a victory, and I would have my favorite drink to celebrate, or it was a disaster, and I would have my favorite drink to brood over.

I don't even know his favorite bourbon. Alaric's the one who told me he prefers bourbon after I spent a year pouring him scotch, which he dutifully drank without comment. I blamed it on not drinking with him in a long time and rationalized that if he strongly objected, he would've said something.

I have excuses for just about everything. But I can't dismiss what Silas pretending to be Damon said just because he's the bad guy. Damon was right: Silas got into my head and said the thing I wish wasn't true but hurts so much because it is.

I swallow the rest of my scotch.

"It'll be a while before she..."

"Yeah," Damon quickly agrees.

"Want me to hang here while you shower? Just in case?"

He shakes his head. "Nah. I'm good."

"You're wearing a tuxedo and a bloody shirt," I point out.

Damon shrugs. "You too, brother. Mine's just nicer."

He doesn't know I saw him deciding what to wear. Damon is impossible to sneak up on, and I wasn't even trying to be quiet. He was so intent on his tie he didn't hear me. He was barefoot in front of the mirror, wearing only black tuxedo slacks. He'd obviously tried on every tux he owned in combination with every dress shirt, the rejected clothing strewn across his bed.

I held my breath and stood without moving and watched while he meticulously knotted tie after tie. Bow ties, skinny ties. He tied them, examined his reflection. Turned his head this way and that. Untied them, tied them again.

If he knew I was watching, he would've cracked some joke because he was wearing tuxedo slacks and a bow tie like one of those strippers. For sure he would've said he didn't care because it's a stupid dance and gone with whatever tie happened to be around his neck at the time. He would've shrugged and waved off his exploded closet. He would've strutted and preened and insulted me for owning just the one tux. If I was very lucky, he would've burst into a rousing chorus of "You're So Vain."

I waited until I was confident he'd decided on a bow tie before sneaking off as silently as I could. He wouldn't have wanted a witness to such an unguarded moment.

Knowing he was going with a bow tie, I decided to not wear one. Damon's always been impossible to buy presents for because he never tells anyone what he wants. He used to make me so mad when we were kids because inevitably, he'd give me something I didn't even know I wanted, but as soon as I held it in my hands, I realized it was what I most desired. What do you get the guy who doesn't want anything? This time, even though he'd never admit it, not to me or anyone, I knew exactly what he wanted. And I've had my chance at legitimate dates. That's what I reminded myself when I bought a black skinny tie and told him to take care of Elena's corsage.

"Do you know what she's wearing?" he asked.

"A dress, I hope," I said.

"The color, asshole."

I shook my head. "No." Damon looked troubled, so I offered him the same advice he gave me before the 20s Decade Dance. "Can't go wrong with a gardenia," I said.

He's staring into the fire when I glance up, running his finger around the rim of his glass so the crystal quietly sings.

_You're just pissed because the sire-bond proves she wasn't in love with you._

Silas as Damon was right. I am pissed. Or I was. I have been. Not so long ago, I was the one staking him in the woods, draining his blood so he was too weak to try and fight his way out of the cell in the basement where Elena's laying unconscious.

I was so mad tonight because I didn't realize it wasn't Damon who'd said that ugly truth before staking me until the real Damon came running to find me. He was hurt, and not just from Silas' stake, and still he ran. I wanted to hate my brother because I know Elena loves him, and I want her to love me. I want her to trust me when she's scared. I want to actually be the person she fell in love with the first day of school. Only I can't hate Damon because as much as he loves her, I think he just might love me more.

"Plan C," I finally say.

Damon looks at me and briefly closes his eyes. "Yeah, about that."

"Being nice isn't working."

"Really, Stefan?" he snaps at me. "I hadn't fucking noticed." He snatches my empty glass out of my hand and refills our drinks.

"This is expensive scotch," I say when he hands me my glass.

"Who cares," he says before taking a gulp from his own drink. "Something about tonight has to not suck."

"Damon," I begin.

"We can't," he interrupts. "Making her fear for her life is not an option."

"Damon," I quietly say.

"I'm not hurting her. I can't. I won't. We're fucking disgusting for even thinking about it."

He can't hurt me either. Not really. We've done our share of wounding over the years, but despite his vow to make my un-life miserable, I've done that just fine on my own. I don't need Damon for misery. He works his best cruelties against himself, not the people he loves. But there's a clarity that comes from pain and no where else. He knows this.

I was wrong. I've been so wrong about so many things. Elena's heart is what makes her special, even if it no longer beats. We should have let it break. We should have let her fall apart. It's what people do when they've lost the person they love most. Instead of asking Damon to make it stop the night Jeremy died, I should've taken care of him so he could take care of her. I should've let her love him.

We have to get her back to the point where she can make that choice for herself. No matter what it takes.

* * *

_A/N: The title comes from Mumford and Son's Timshel. Go listen on youtube if you're not familiar with the tune._


	31. Forget About Me

_A/N: Elena POV that takes place between Pictures of You (4.19) and The Originals (4.20). This is my attempt to make sense of what seems completely nonsensical. I'm not sure how successful I am, to tell you the truth. But I tried. My gratitude, always, to CreepingMuse._

_***It was brought to my attention (thank you, FrenchChris, for the fact-check) that Stefan vervains Elena in Bring It On (4.16), so this is not the first time. Please excuse the canonical gaffe.***_

* * *

**Forget About Me**

"Elena?"

He speaks softly, like he knows how loud everything sounds, how I'm trapped in my head and can't get away because I can't move. I'm wide awake but paralyzed, passing the time by counting the clock ticks because there's nothing else to do in the dark. The clock is far away, but his voice is close. So close I can feel his breath.

He sounds much better than the clock.

I must be in the cell in the basement. There was the terrible screeching metallic sound when he opened and closed the door. And now he's right here, next to me. He smells strangely of scotch instead of bourbon. It's a subtle difference I wouldn't have noticed before, but Stefan drinks scotch, not Damon. I know exactly what Damon is supposed to smell like. I know every inch of him. I know the sound of air swooshing in his lungs and the blood in his veins.

Blood. There's blood. It's not fresh, but I smell it.

"Elena?"

Damon. Damon's blood. Dried blood.

"Elena?"

"_You must be Elena. I'm Damon, Stefan's brother."_

_Heart hammering in my throat. I can't breathe. This is so embarrassing. Why didn't Stefan tell me he had a brother? Why didn't he tell me his brother is so hot? Oh my gosh. He must think I'm a creepy kid. I just waltzed into their house like I own the place, and now I'm staring. This is so wrong. Look away, Elena. Look away from him right this instant. But those eyes... _

"Elena, can you open your eyes?"

I try to open my eyes because it's the least I can do for him, but they're too heavy, my lashes dipped in concrete and the lids lined with sand. My tongue is thick and stuck to the roof of my mouth, so I can't tell him I can't open my eyes. Instead, I squeeze the warm fingers that are gently holding my hand. Even this slight movement hurts, and I hear a pitiful sound from a wounded animal.

I think it's coming from me.

I did this. To both of them. It seemed like a good idea when I was on the other side of the bars. Vervain. Starvation. I've starved before, at the very beginning, but I've never been vervained. I know it won't kill me, but I had no idea it feels like this. I thought it made vampires fall asleep, like breaking a neck. But I am not sleeping. It's the opposite of sleeping, everything too loud and too bright, even behind closed eyes. Visions and thoughts racing through my brain faster and more vivid than dreams. And I can't make them stop. I can't even move.

"Okay," he soothes. "I know it hurts. But I'm going to try and make you a little more comfortable. Can you open your mouth for me? Just a little bit? I'm going to give you a sip of water."

"_I'm giving you what you need. Drink... Just don't tell Stefan... Blood sharing is kind of personal."_

_I sink my fangs into his outstretched palm, biting through his skin with fangs that are too sensitive. But the sting of the bite and the discomfort in my gums is overwhelmed with the taste of him. _

_Damon. _

_His blood isn't as hot, but it's thicker than the animals I drank in the woods. I push him until he stops moving back, and I drink with a greedy, sucking moan. I try to stop but I can't because he tastes so good and I'm so hungry and I want more. _

_But I pull away because this is way past 'kind of personal,' and his hand on my head stops me. Softly, so softly, he strokes my hair. _

_"Go on," he whispers. "Please." _

_I bite again, and my teeth still hurt but not as much as they did just a minute ago, and this time, when I push against him, he has no where else to go and I feel it. Feel him. I'm pressed against him, and I hear myself moan because even through all these clothes I can feel him there. Right there. Nothing has ever felt as good as my hips rubbing against him while I drink. He shifts away from me. _

_No, Damon. Please. I need... I need... _

_Oh. God. There. Right there. Don't stop. Never stop touching me. _

_S_omething cold trickles into my mouth. It's not blood. Not Damon's or anyone else's.

Water. He said he would give me a sip of water. I don't want water. He has to know I want blood.

But it's wet. Wonderfully wet. I move my tongue. It still hurts, but at least it's not stuck to the top of my mouth. It tastes like it was set on fire. And bitter. My tongue tastes charred and bitter.

Must be the vervain.

"That's it," he says. "If you swallow, I'll give you some more."

He's gently encouraging but not patronizing. He's much kinder than I've been when he and Stefan have been locked up. I suspect I sounded like quite the sanctimonious bitch when I lectured about how easy it could be, how they could get out and return to the world of comforts like food and complete consciousness if only they did what I was asking them to do. And I don't even want to imagine how tedious Stefan would be at this moment, his guilt dripping from his pores while simultaneously nothing would be his fault.

"_I know you love Stefan, and it will always be Stefan, but I love you. You should know that."_

Moving hurts, even the tiny movement in my throat to make the water leave my mouth.

"I'm so sorry," he whispers so quietly I'm not sure if he really said it.

"_I want to apologize. Please... I know I don't deserve your forgiveness, but I need it."_

I take another small sip. It doesn't hurt to swallow so much this time. And the time after that is even better. My mouth still tastes terrible, but I can move it again, and just that little bit of water is enough to make me think I can open my eyes.

"Hey," he says. He smiles, but it's tight and sad. It doesn't make it all the way to his eyes. He hasn't smiled like that since the morning after Miss Mystic Falls. Our one perfect morning together. "Thought you might feel better if we got you cleaned up."

He hasn't cleaned up yet. He's still wearing his white shirt. A white shirt with a bloody hole in it. He's not wearing his tie or his jacket anymore, and he's unbuttoned the top button of his shirt. But he's kneeling on the dirt floor in tuxedo pants that probably cost more than my entire wardrobe.

Why hasn't he showered? Damon is meticulous. Always.

How long have I been here? Has he been with me the whole time?

No. I would have heard him. There was the door. And there's the scotch smell. He was drinking with Stefan. He must be showering now, or maybe sleeping, or Damon wouldn't be down here with me because Stefan doesn't do nice things for the people locked up in the basement. Stefan must believe in the Lexi School of Tough Love.

Damon probably told Stefan to go upstairs first. He probably said he was going to clean up or have another drink. Anything to get Stefan away so he could break the rules and sneak me water. And Stefan probably knew Damon was lying, but he left anyway because they do that thing where they understand each other best when they're not speaking.

"Another sip?" Damon holds up a glass of ice water with a straw sticking out of the end. "Between Bonnie's magical migraine and the vervain..." He voice trails off into a sigh.

I try to say yes, please. More. But all I can manage is opening my mouth like a baby bird. He holds the straw steady, bent at just the right angle so I don't have to move, and I swallow again. When the water is gone, he puts down the glass and holds up one of those tiny disposable toothbrushes that don't have toothpaste, just minty flavor.

"Open for me? Vervain breath is a bitch."

My gums are sore, but Damon is careful to not touch them. He barely touches the teeth that become fangs, but even gentle pressure feels like being stabbed. I forgive him, though, because he brushes away the disgusting film on my teeth and replaces the terrible taste with mint.

"All right," he says, putting aside the toothbrush.

I move my hand and stick my finger through the bloody hole in his shirt. His skin underneath is healed, warm and smooth beneath my fingertip. But someone stabbed him. Another beautiful shirt ruined.

He was hurt and bleeding.

"Yeah, there was an... incident." He shrugs. "It wouldn't be a Mystic Falls party without an incident."

"Stefan?" I ask.

"Nope, just looked like him. Long story." I watch as he tilts his head, studying my dress, like he's thinking. "Did you steal it because you really liked it, or just to piss off Caroline?" He swallows. "Because you look beautiful. It looks much better on you. The color's all wrong for her. I don't know what she was thinking. But..." He looks me up and down again. "If you don't plan on wearing it again, it'd be easier if I just ripped."

"I don't care," I manage to say, my voice small and dry.

Damon looks away from me and takes a couple of deep breaths. "Right. You don't care. About anything."

He tears the dress in two, from the bodice all the way down through the layers of the skirt. I can feel its soft folds underneath me, but all I can think about is the fact that I'm wearing pretty underwear. And a matching strapless bra. And a garter belt and stockings because I've always wanted to wear them and never did before and prom seemed like as good a time as any. I stood in front of the mirror before I put on the dress, wearing only my new lingerie and heels. I felt different. Sexy and powerful, and I thought it was a shame no one else would get to see me dressed like this.

Damon makes a rumbling noise and closes his eyes, squeezing his forehead hard enough it's like he's trying to reach his brain with his fingers.

"Oh Elena," he softly says. "This is not how I wanted tonight to go."

We haven't gotten to the pretty lingerie stage of our relationship yet. We've had sex. But we skipped over a lot of the in-between steps, where we'd flirt and tease and almost but not quite, and I'd make sure he went to sleep knowing I was wearing pretty underwear that one day he would be able to see. We kind of sort of did that when I was with Stefan, but not officially. I'm pretty sure it doesn't count.

I'm glad he gets to see my underwear now.

His fingers are certain and practiced as they unclip my stockings, making short work of what took me nearly thirty minutes to put on. It makes me wonder how many women he's undressed in his life. We haven't gotten to that stage of our relationship either, when we confess our past romances.

Maybe it's just as well.

He quickly takes everything off with the same clinical detachment they use at the hospital when someone needs to be undressed. He has a bowl of water and a soft cloth, and the sound of dripping is very loud as he wrings away the excess.

"Close your eyes," he says.

He washes my face first. He's especially attentive around my eyes, and it feels so good to have the make-up gone. Then he gently moves down. The cloth leaves trails of warmth that remind me of his tongue. After he finishes my feet, I open my eyes and watch as he pulls out clean clothes and begins redressing me.

"You shopped?" I ask.

He shakes he head. "I may have bought more than just one pair of jeans this summer. When I lost that poker game."

The panties are plain and black, but the cotton is so soft and smooth. He maneuvers me into a pair of jeans and a camisole and long sleeved t-shirt, all nicer than anything I've ever worn, including Caroline's stolen dress.

These feel expensively Damon-nice.

"I just couldn't..." His voice trails off. "I couldn't leave you down here like that."

He left Katherine in the tomb in a fancy dress and heels and eye make-up for a long time.

"Better?" he asks.

"Blood," I say.

"Yeah." He sighs. "Listen, this is going to be hard..."

"Hungry," I repeat, interrupting him.

"I can't do it. Not until you come back."

I close my eyes and swallow without it hurting too much because Damon brought me water even though I'm sure he wasn't supposed to.

It's come full circle. It's my turn to suffer until I follow the rules. It's never worked on Stefan. It's never worked on Damon. They both eventually came around not because they were locked up, but because they chose to, and yet they think this time it will work on me because they want it to so badly. They think they will make it work by sheer force of will.

Silly, idiot boys making decisions for me. Again. Or maybe it's still?

They never learn.

"Elena? You still with me?"

Where does he think I'm going to go? I'm full of vervain and locked in the dungeon in his basement.

"Elena, please don't drag this out. I can't..." He sighs. "You need to let us help you."

_"I can help you. I want you to let me help you... Just turn it off, and everything will go away. That's what you have to do. It's what I want you to do."_

_The sudden silence inside myself as my mind found the switch and did what Damon wanted. Flip. _

_He was right that night in my room when he snapped Jeremy's neck. It's the easiest thing in the world. Why didn't I think of this? All that horrible, crushing pain is gone. Just gone. I'm still sitting on the floor, and Damon's hands are still on my face, but I don't care that I can smell lighter fluid and Jeremy's rotting corpse. _

_I don't care everyone's dead because of me. _

_I don't care._

"I was wrong, Elena. Listen to me. That night, I was trying to help. I thought I couldn't see you in that much pain. But I was wrong, and I was selfish."

"_What I'm about to say is probably the most selfish thing I've ever said in my life... I love you, Elena. And it's because I love you that I can't be selfish with you."_

"Elena." He holds my hand again and gently squeezes. "I had no right to make that choice for you."

"_It's not okay. All those years I blamed Stefan. No one forced me to love her. It was my own choice. I made the wrong choice."_

"I need you to come back, Elena. And if you decide you want to turn off your humanity again, I won't stop you. But it has to be your choice. Not mine."

Oh, the irony. He's forcing my humanity back so I can make my own choice.

"I don't want to hurt you."

"_Elena, get out of here. I could hurt you."_

"Elena, look at me."

I open my eyes, and he's staring at me, as if he can see the switch and flip it himself if only he looks hard enough. He takes my hand and brings it to his lips, softly kissing each of my fingers.

"I've made so many mistakes, Elena. So many fucking mistakes. I don't want you to have to live through that. It's only a matter of time before you do something you can't take back, and you'll hate yourself. I can't let that happen."

Damon. The closet hero. He wants to save me. Only he already has. Why can't he see that? Damon, of all people, should understand.

I'm fine.

And he thinks I don't know him? That I haven't been paying attention to him this whole time? I know he won't hurt me. He kills strangers, sure. But he can't hurt me. He'll give in.

He can't make me do anything. I decide. I choose.

"I don't care."

"Yes, you do," he insists.

"No," I say. "I don't."

"You are the most infuriatingly stubborn..." He sighs and my hand drops to the cot when he lets go of it. "Elena, I love you. Don't forget that. No matter what happens." He stands up and walks towards the door. "You will care, goddammit. You will fucking care."

The door closes with loud, metallic finality.

* * *

_A/N: upupa-epops has a fabulous little fic with an incredibly well-written "off" Elena. It's called Forgetting, and you should go and read it._


	32. The View From the Front Row

_A/N: Ric's POV from She's Come Undone (4.21), which will encompass various aspects of S4, as well as events that take place in previous Bourbon Before Breakfast chapters. Many (never enough) gracious thanks to CreepingMuse._

* * *

**The View From the Front Row **

"Ric?" Damon's voice is quiet, but it rings so loudly in my head he could be shouting into my ear. "You here 'cause I really need you."

"Yeah. I'm here."

Fat lot of good it does him, since I can't do anything but listen and watch helplessly while he fucks up over and over again. There are times, as much as I hate to admit it, I wish I could ignore his summons. I tell myself it'd be in everyone's best interest if I didn't care so much, if I left him alone to do what he thinks is best, even if I disagree.

I wish I could walk away. But I can't. I'm committed now, for better or worse. And lately, it's mostly worst.

"Christ, you had shit taste in liquor." He swallows from my bottle of bourbon, not the good stuff he always buys, and winces. But he swallows again anyway, cradling the bottle in his hands as if it's precious.

"Ric, I'm fucking up. Again."

"No shit, jackass. And I think you're looking for 'fucking up still,' not again."

But it's easy to judge from the cheap seats, and let's face it, the Other Side is nothing but front row viewing of all the things I can't do anything about. I understand, first hand, the pain that comes with the realization that the person you love didn't exactly love you back. And I didn't always make the best choices after Isobel left. Then again, I didn't always make the best choices before her, or while I was with her.

I drank too much, sure. I picked a bar fight or two. I put my life in danger by running around with the vampire I swore I would kill. I died enough times to become a vampire hunter hell-bent on murdering the people I love. But I didn't go and create a magical penalty box for supernatural creatures because my wife didn't love me enough. Talk about hell having no fury. Just kill the lying bastard already and be done with it. Jesus.

The hypocrisy of this place fucking kills me. Or it would, if I weren't already dead.

* * *

Jeremy and I are at the house with Elena. He spends most of the time standing right next to her, shouting.

"Elena! I'm dead! You can let me go!"

Of course I try to tell him that it won't do any good, but he can shout all he wants if it makes him feel better, but in the end, it probably won't. I sit in the corner, out of the way, trying not to cry because dammit, Jeremy isn't supposed to be here. He's supposed to live a long, normal life and then die, old and happy and loved.

He got the die loved part right, but not the rest. And like me, magic fucked him over. He didn't get to die a human and go on. He's stuck.

"Dude, that has to stink," he says to me during one of his breaks from shouting at her. "Don't you think I stink?"

I shrug. "Maybe she's used to you stinking."

He elbows me and stands so close to Elena that if he were breathing, she would feel it.

"Why can't she smell it? She's a vampire."

I sigh. "She doesn't want to, Jeremy."

"Never underestimate the power of denial?"

"Yeah. Something like that." I look at him and smile. "Where'd you pick up psycho-babble bullshit?"

"The school guidance counselor after Mom and Dad."

We both breathe easier even though we don't need to breathe when Damon finally gets back to the house.

"Thank God," Jeremy says. "Someone who isn't going to be retarded. He'll talk some sense into her."

Jeremy says that because he doesn't know Damon. I know better. I know he's going to hurt as much as Elena because that's who Damon is. That's what he does. He runs around like a dick and acts like he doesn't care because he actually cares too fucking much.

We watch while Damon carries Jeremy's body so gently down the stairs. Like the night Liz shot him, and I knew he was dead, but I carried him like he wasn't. Damon's that careful with him. As if he might hurt Jeremy even though I know he has to be holding his breath, that Jeremy's body is stiff and unyielding and difficult to manage.

Damon places him on the sofa where I slept for all those weeks. All those nights I fell asleep with my feet in his lap. All those lazy afternoons, the blinds closed against the sun, the living room dim and cool, while he and Jeremy played video games.

"What's he doing?" Jeremy asks, his voice starting to panic. "What's happening?"

"Damon," I whisper when I realize what he's going to do. "No."

Fuck Stefan for asking that of him when he and Caroline have been giving Damon nothing but grief about the sire bond. It isn't his fault. And instead of seeing it for what it is, proof that she really does love him, Damon panicked. Believed the worst of himself. Ran away. Turned her off.

"Dammit, Damon. Don't do this!" I shout when he drops to his knees on the floor on puts his hand on Elena's cheek.

I never wanted Elena to fall in love with Damon because I wanted a normal life for her. But that ship sailed. Or rather, it drowned at the bottom of the river. I trusted Damon to look out for her, but instead he's shutting down the part of her that matters, the part he loves the most because he's a fucking coward. Well, that and he loves her. But still, it's wrong, and he knows it. He fucking knows it, and he's doing it anyway.

Jeremy and I stand in the yard and watch the Camaro's taillights fade and the fire consume the house. No one in the car's thinking of us, so we're stranded, waiting and watching and helpless until the firetrucks arrive.

* * *

"I fucked up for real this time," he says.

"You sure did. What are you going to do about it besides sit in the cemetery and whine to a rock?"

He takes a moderate swallow from my cheap bourbon.

"This is the last one, you know. The last bottle you bought. Maybe there were others, in the house, I hadn't found..." His voice trails off and he takes another sip, holding my bourbon in his mouth before finally swallowing. "I tell myself I could buy your cheap-ass booze if I wanted, but it's not that. It's just..." His thumb smooths the paper label. "This is yours. And now it's gone."

"I miss you too."

* * *

"Who gets the supernatural Get Out Of Jail Free card?" he asks. He's back to drinking his snobby bourbon when he pulls Jeremy's ring from his pocket. "Risks, of course. We know that now. No unnecessary neck-snapping." He sighs and turns the ring over in his hand. "It comes down to Matt or Liz. They're the only two humans left. At least the only ones I give two shits about."

"Matt," I answer without hesitation.

"I'm leaning towards Matt," he says. "I'm still pissed at him for not dying, but that wasn't his fault. That was my brother and Elena." He sighs again. "She still loves him. She always will. Maybe, if I'm not enough, maybe he can be useful."

"Stop being a dick and give it to him already," I say. "Better yet, write him a fat check and tell him to get the fuck out while he can."

"I know he hates me, but I'm not going to hold that against him. Who doesn't hate me?" He swallows from the bottle. "I hate me too."

"Stop feeling sorry for yourself," I snap.

But it's impossible to stay mad at Damon. I don't know why anyone even bothers trying, since we all know they'll come around in the end. Would save a lot of trouble if they skipped the "Damon sucks dick" part and went immediately to the "We really need Damon." It's always been impossible to stay mad, even when he does unforgivable things. He killed Jeremy. He killed me, the jackass. Twice. And I still love him.

So of course she still loves him too. I want to throttle him for not seeing that she's feeling all over the goddamn place. Could she be so pissed off at Caroline without feelings? Could she be so stubbornly determined against him and Stefan without serious emotion backing it up? I know Elena can be insufferable, but she and Damon, those two need to duke it out over the "Most Infuriating" award.

* * *

"Graduation, Damon?" she taunts from the vault.

"Graduation?" I echo from my spot where I lean against the wall. "You can't do better than graduation, Casanova? She's supposed to want to come back to the world of feelings for a polyester cap and gown? You gave Rose goddamn ponies."

* * *

"Mr. Saltzman!" Matt jumps when he sees me. He's standing here in the woods, wide-eyed and breathing too hard even though he doesn't need to breathe when he's on This Side.

"Hi."

"What happened? Am I?"

"Yeah," I quietly say. I nod towards his lifeless body on the ground. "You're dead."

"He actually killed me?"

I nod towards Elena, who's crying and kneeling on the dirt.

"Recent events notwithstanding," I point out. "Damon's usually right. It was a good plan."

"Why are you here and not my sister? Or Jeremy?"

"We can only be here if someone's thinking about us."

Matt looks puzzled. "Elena's thinking about you?"

I slowly shake my head. She hasn't thought of me a in while.

"Really?" he asks as understanding flashes across his face. "Damon's thinking about you?"

"Yeah," I say.

"Does he do that a lot?"

I don't answer because I know he wouldn't want me to. Matt and I stand in silence while Stefan speaks quietly with Elena. He must want, more than anything, to pull her into his arms and comfort her, but Damon steps back and lets Stefan have time with Elena. Maybe he's worried she won't want him. I don't know. But he busies himself gathering Matt's body into his arms and carefully placing him in the truck.

"He has to know I'm dead, right?" Matt asks.

"It's just his way," I say.

"I think of him more as a neck-snapping, heart-ripping type."

"Well, he does that too."

"Am I going to want to kill people now?" he quietly asks.

I shake my head. "Not yet. Maybe not ever. But try not to die too often, okay?"

He smiles. "Yeah. That's solid advice right there."

"You won't remember any of this when you wake up," I tell him.

"I won't?"

"No. But I'm going to say this anyway." The things Esther said to me slipped into my subconscious while I was dead, so I can't not try to do the same with Matt. "I know I'm not a very good role model..."

"Please, Mr. Saltzman," he interrupts. "We all miss you. We need you. My God, we need you so much. Without you, it's just a bunch of kids running around like maniacs. Stefan and Damon are in charge, for God's sake." I laugh in spite of myself. "We need you."

"Well," I say, clearing my throat. "I need you to stay alive. Live a normal life. Do that for everyone who didn't get to, okay? Get the hell out of this town and stay away. Run, and never look back."

He swallows. "Rebekah said..." He shakes his head. "Nothing. Never mind."

"Be the person who remembers, Matt. Remember, but don't go down with the ship. It's too late for everyone else. But not you."

"You stayed," he quietly points out.

"Yeah, and look how well that turned out."

"Are you sorry?"

I watch, once again, as taillights fade into the darkness. "No."

* * *

"Ric?" he whispers in his room. The house is dark and quiet, and Damon's curled in the corner on the floor, clutching a bottle of bourbon. "Are you here? Ric, I need you. I fucking need you."

"I'm here," I answer with a sigh. "But I can't help you."

"I need help."

"You're going to be fine, Damon."

"I have to get back downstairs, in case she wakes up, but Ric. Jesus fucking Christ, Ric. What have we done? Every time we think we're helping, we just make it worse. Now she wants to kill Katherine. Elena wants to kill her. I thought..."

He swallows greedily from the bottle, his shaking hands spilling onto his shirt.

"I can't make her decisions for her. But I can't just sit here and watch her fuck up."

"Yes, you can," I say. "You have to."

"I don't know what to do. Ric, what do I do?"

I squat down on the floor and look him in the eyes.

"Make peace that it's not your life," I say. "Accept that her choices are out of your control. Love her, even when she's making mistakes. Especially when she's making mistakes. But don't live for her. Live with her."

"Ric? Ric, are you here?"

"I'm here. I'm always here."


	33. My Brother's Wisdom

_A/N: Expanded conversation from The Walking Dead (4.22). Happy Day to all those who love with a mother's heart._

* * *

**My Brother's Wisdom**

I mean it when I tell Kol to go ahead and kill me. I should have died, many times over, and I keep cheating death. Maybe this is it. Maybe this is the time it's supposed to stick for real and for good and for always. Maybe being dead is as peaceful as everyone assured me after Mom and Dad died.

I'm ready to let Kol kill me. Only suddenly Jeremy's here too.

My brother saves me even though I didn't save him.

"Elena," he says.

I wrap my arms around Jeremy's neck and wipe my tears against his shirt. He feels solid and warm, and when I press my weight against him, he shifts his feet so we don't fall to the ground while he hugs me back. He doesn't have a pulse and he's not breathing, and I know it's because he's dead.

My brother is dead.

Jeremy is dead, but he's here for this moment, and that's more than I could've hoped for, so I push the rest of the thoughts out of my mind and squeeze even tighter. I squeeze until he grunts a little.

"I miss you too," he whispers.

"Jeremy," I finally say, and I try to stop crying so I can see him clearly because who knows how long this is going to last, but I can't. Now that the tears have started, I can't make them stop. "Jeremy."

"Elena, it's okay."

"Jeremy," I say again because I can never say his name enough. "Jeremy."

"It's okay," he repeats.

"No, it's not. You're dead. You're still dead."

"Technically, so are you."

"You're dead-dead. You're... And then I... It's been... I just..."

I'm a coward. Everyone's lost people. There've been so many funerals in the past two years, but I shut down instead dealing with another death. I didn't care what was buried in this hole we're standing on top of or carved into this stone.

"Jeremy, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

Jeremy pulls away from me just enough to look me in the eyes. He cups my face in his hands. When did my little brother's hands get big enough to do that? He brushes tears from my cheeks with his thumbs and smiles.

"It's okay," he repeats.

"I didn't even pick out your gravestone," I whisper, looking away.

"I don't care."

"I do. I care. I should have... I abandoned you... Jeremy..."

"It's a rock," he says.

"It's a stupid rock, though."

A stupid, generic rock I didn't pick out. I know Damon didn't either. I don't know who did. Caroline maybe? Stefan? It shines too brightly in the darkness because it's unweathered. So many stones now. There are too many Gilberts buried in this earth. I've worn too many black dresses and eaten too many casseroles and smiled politely and thanked people for too many condolences that do nothing except make the person saying them feel better.

I don't even know what they buried in Jeremy's grave.

Jeremy smiles and shrugs, pulling me back into his arms. "Ric's dates are wrong, so at least I'm accurate."

"That's not funny," I say.

He shrugs. "It's a little bit funny." He hugs me again and tucks my head under his chin. "You've been giving Stefan and Damon a run for their money," Jeremy quietly accuses.

I don't even know what I'm capable of anymore. I gut-staked Damon. And in that moment at the school, when Stefan was so calmly telling me that turning off my humanity was cheating, I just needed to punch him. I protected my fingers, the way Ric showed me, and felt the bones of his face crunch beneath my fist.

But dammit, he was right when he said I have to face my grief. Stefan was right. There's no getting around that.

"Do you need to go and find Bonnie?" I ask.

"Don't change the subject. I'm where I need to be and who I need to be with."

"Jer," I begin.

"Elena, I don't know how long I have, so shut up and listen."

"When did you get so wise? And bossy?"

"When I died and had nothing but time and nothing to fill it with other than thinking." I nod for him to continue. "The summer after Mom and Dad died, you tried so hard to make me see it wasn't hopeless, that I would wake up one day and realize I didn't feel so awful." He smiles and shakes his head. "All I wanted to do was lay in bed and get high and screw around with Vicki."

"Oh!" I say. "Don't. Just... Don't."

"And there were days I swore all you did was give me different versions of the Tough Love Lecture," Jeremy continues as if I hadn't interrupted. "I hated you for it, I might add. I hated you telling me what to do when I knew you were just as miserable as I was. I hated your fake smile when you kept assuring everyone how fine we were when we were anything but fine. I thought you were betraying Mom and Dad by acting like life could just go on even though they were dead."

"Oh Jeremy," I say, my eyes once again spilling over with tears. "I'm so sorry."

"No, Elena. Listen. You were right. You drove me crazy, but you were right. A year later, Mom and Dad were still dead. Jenna and Uncle John were dead. Vicki was dead. Anna was dead. Tyler was a werewolf and Caroline was a vampire. We'd both been killed and then been brought back to life. Stefan was gone and killing people. Ric was living out a gym bag and sleeping on the sofa and we kept thinking one day he would just be gone like everyone else. It should've sucked. Except it didn't. Those couple of months were the best."

I nod. "They really were."

"Because we let them be. Well, that and Damon would've kicked our asses if we'd moped around."

I smile and nod my head in agreement.

"You're potentially going to live forever. You aren't going to have any friends because you might outlive them? You're just going to give up and let a maniac Original kill you? You're going to pick fights you know you can't win? Death by Katherine is the dumbest idea you've ever had, and that's really saying something because your plans are always stupid."

"I want to end her, Jeremy," I insist. "For you."

"Bullshit," he says. "You're doing it for you. I'm dead. The only thing you can do for me is remember, and you can't do that after Katherine kills you."

"She killed you, Jeremy."

"I died. It's no one's fault. People are supposed to die. You and Stefan and Damon and Caroline? You're the freaks."

"You're just a kid..."

"No, Elena," he interrupts. "I'm not. I haven't been for a long time."

"I wanted to protect you, and I didn't. I couldn't keep you safe. I couldn't even keep you alive."

"Get over it. Here we are now. There's a desiccated bad guy to deal with. Again. And vengeful ghosts. Again. And you have a choice to make. Again."

"We do seem to be repeating ourselves," I agree. "Mystic Falls is obviously some kind of evil time warp."

"A hellmouth for sure," Jeremy agrees with a smile. When I make a face, he shrugs.

I sniffle. "I don't know what I want... or who..."

"Yes you do," Jeremy says. "You know exactly who you want. You're still just being stupid, and he's too nice to tell you that."

"He's not always that nice."

"Whatever. Stop whining. You're lucky, Elena. Everyone loves you. Everyone is trying to keep you safe."

"Jeremy," I begin.

"I'm back from the dead," he interrupts. "You're getting what we didn't get with Mom or Dad or Jenna. You get to make your peace, Elena. I'm here now, so you have a chance to say what you need to say so you'll be all right. Because I can't stay this time. And you need to get your head out of your ass and stop acting like a bitch."

"And here I thought you were going to be sweet and tell me how much you love me," I say.

"I am. This is my Tough Love Lecture, the condensed version."

I nod. "It's a good one."

He kisses the top of my head. "Yeah, well, I had a good teacher."


	34. The Beginning In the End

_A/N: Expanded Damon POV from Graduation (4.23)_

* * *

**The Beginning In the End**

I duck under the yellow police tape and shoulder open the locked door, closing it behind me. Light from the streetlights in the square dimly slants in through the blinds, and I don't bother flipping on the overheads. Everything smells wet and singed.

Someone tried to blow up the Grille. Again. What the fuck is wrong with this town, and why the fuck do I insist on living here?

Glass crunches under my boots when I walk across to the bar, carefully righting two fallen stools and brushing them off with my hand. Without a trusty bartender around to pour my drink before I can even order it, I have to go around and fetch my bottle myself. It's waiting, unsealed and untroubled by the earlier blast, on the top shelf.

Luckily, the glasses in the freezer are clean and undamaged, so I grab one and a single ice cube. I drop it just so, and it falls from the right distance to make the sound I love to hear even though I don't like my bourbon chilled. It clinks delicately against the heavy glass bottom, the sound its own kind of song, but not so hard that it chips and waters down the bourbon too quickly as it melts.

I pour Ric the first drink after I crack the seal, and I sit down at the stool next to his, content to drink from the bottle. I raise it and nod towards the empty stool before taking a swallow.

"Here's to." I clear my throat. "Here's to the girl. Our girl. May I miraculously find a way to keep her safe and happy and not let either of you down."

My voice is too loud in the dim emptiness. I shouldn't have come here. I should've gone with Stefan because I know Lexi left him when Ric left me, but I didn't want to talk about Elena. He gave me his blessing, which is more than I ever hoped for because Stefan's heart is breaking. Even though I'm unbelievably happy, his sadness makes my heart break just a little bit too. I should've gone with Elena to find Bonnie and Jeremy because now he's gone again too, but I did the wrong thing the first time that happened. I didn't want to be tempted into doing something stupid again.

I should've done a lot of things. But instead, once again, I was selfish. I told myself Elena and Stefan deserved their time alone with the people they love. I wanted them to have their goodbyes. But even I didn't believe that sentimental bullshit. I just wanted one more drink. Only before I could even hand it to him, he was gone. Again.

I suppose, if I'm honest with myself, it's just as well. There would never be enough drinks. And I don't do mushy goodbyes. Or hellos, for that matter. I'm not that guy.

The door opens, and for a split second I shift my weight and tense, waiting for the inevitable ambush. But then the door softly closes and even though she doesn't move or say anything, I relax because no one else in the world smells like that.

Well, technically, I suppose Katherine does. But Katherine smells like make-up and expensive perfume and a million other things that cover up the best scent in the world. Elena mostly just smells like Elena.

She walks slowly, picking her way through the rubble on the floor in her high heels. She's waiting, I suppose, for me to say or do something. To stop her or ask her to hurry. But I don't even turn around. I wait until she's here, right here next to me. She rests her head against mine.

"Hey," she whispers.

"Hey back."

"I figured you wouldn't be at the house, after." She sighs, leaving the rest of her thought unspoken. "So I stopped here on my way, just in case."

"Good call," I say. I don't tell her I couldn't stand being there alone, but I know she understands because she knew right where to find me.

"Connor was here," she says.

"When I smelled the C-4, I figured."

"Ric told me, but I guess he forget to tell you."

"There was a lot going on," I say.

"That could be the story of our lives. Or unlives. Whatever."

She moves towards Ric's stool.

"That seat's taken," I say. "Let me." I get up to right another stool for her, one on the other side of me, but before I can, she pulls out Ric's stool and sits down.

"It is taken," she quietly agrees.

"Elena," I begin.

She picks up Ric's drink and takes a sip. She shudders just a little as she swallows.

"Maybe we should find you a different drink," I suggest.

"It's growing on me. The first couple of sips are still." She shrugs and gestures towards my stool. "Are you going to just stand there?" When I don't answer right away, she nods and stands up. "I'll sit other there. It's not a big deal. It's just." She sighs. "He wouldn't." She shakes her head. "He wouldn't want you."

"I know," I quietly agree even though she hasn't said anything. I know what she means, and she's right. I sit down and pat Ric's stool. "Join me."

She sits back down and turns, raising Ric's glass. "To Ric," she says. Her eyes are bright with tears and she has to clear her throat before continuing. "To Ric, and to Lexi, and to..."

I clink the bottle against Ric's glass to stop her and swallow. "If you list them all, you'll have a glass of expensive, watered-down bourbon."

"And here I thought we were shamelessly stealing booze." She takes another drink, shuddering a second time.

"Growing on you?" I tease.

"As Caroline once observed, like a festering fungus."

I smile and shake my head. We were drinking during that conversation too. Jesus, I drink a lot. It'd be easier, no doubt, to list the conversations when I wasn't drinking. "I thought I was cancer."

"According to her, you're both."

I laugh. "Well, I guess we'll have to work on that."

She shrugs. "I thought you said you weren't sorry and you weren't going to change."

I can't stop myself from staring at her, waiting for her to scold or cajole or otherwise try to reform me. But she doesn't look at me, merely sits on Ric's stool and sips his drink, the silence as comfortable between us as it always was between me and Ric.

"I thought you said I already had changed," I finally say.

"We both have." She leans her head on my shoulder again and sighs. "I hate to start out this way, but there's something I need to tell you. Something that will probably upset you."

"Good lord." I take a bracing swallow from the bottle.

"I went to the school looking for Bonnie and Jeremy," she begins.

I put both hands on her shoulders and shake her just a little. "Are you okay? Is Stefan okay?"

"Yes. I'm fine. I assume Stefan is fine."

I take a deep breath and reach for the bottle again. I can't handle anything else. Not today. "Okay," I say. I swallow. "Okay."

"I didn't mean to scare you," she begins.

"For fuck's sake! Just spit it out already. You're killing me."

"Katherine tried to kill me."

I look at her, and once again she looks away from me. She swallows more bourbon and shudders just a tiny bit and tries to rest her head on my shoulder again, but I shrug and force her to sit up.

"Elena?"

She sticks a finger through the bloody hole in her dress I hadn't even noticed because she's wearing a jacket. I should've smelled the blood. Now that I see it, it's all I can smell, but before, with the chemicals and the smoke, I didn't even notice. I'm fucking up already, and she's been my girl for ten minutes.

Goddamn Katherine Pierce. For trying to kill her. For ruining her graduation dress, the dress she wore when she told me she loves me.

She almost killed Elena.

Fucking Katherine.

"It's funny," she begins.

"Funny?" I demand. "This is the opposite of funny. Enough is enough. So help me, I'm going to kill that bitch for real this time."

"Can I finish telling you my story, or are you going to keep interrupting me?"

I roll my eyes and sigh before gesturing for her to continue.

"It's funny," she repeats. "Because Jeremy told me, when he first came back, that death by Katherine –" She shakes her head and smile. "That's what he called my plan for vengeance: Death by Katherine. Anyway, he said I was stupid. That she would kill me."

"How close did she get?" I quietly ask before I can stop myself, knowing first hand how strong and sneaky and skilled Katherine is. Bitch is a goddamn warrior princess, and she had my girl.

Elena ruefully shakes her head and takes another sip of Ric's drink. "Pretty close."

"What happened?"

Elena takes another sip, and I resist the urge to throttle her. "She had a stake through my neck and her hand around my heart."

"Jesus," I mutter, pulling Elena into my arms. I stroke her hair and rest my fingers gently on her cheek. "You cannot," I begin. I realize I'm shaking, and I kiss her hair before looking her in the eyes. "You can't do that. I can't lose you."

"I have no intention of being lost." She smiles. "See? I lived to tell the tale. But. Here's the thing."

"What happened?" I ask again.

"Just before she was able to pull out my heart, I shoved the cure into her mouth."

"What?"

"That's how I stopped her from killing me. I cured Katherine."

"Katherine's human?"

"I think?" Elena bites her lip. "I mean, probably, assuming that was actually the cure and not a trick? I never know what to believe anymore. But she was unconscious when I left."

"You cured her and then just left her at the school?"

Elena nods, and I can't help but laugh. I laugh harder than I have in years. I laugh so hard tears blur my vision.

"Sweet fucking Christ, woman," I finally manage to say. Once more I pull her against me. "I love you."

"But it was the only cure," she insists. "And we didn't use it to get rid of Silas, and we didn't give it to someone who wanted it."

"You fucking cured Katherine!"

"Damon, I'm being serious."

"So am I." I trace her lips with my finger. "I love you, Elena."

"Damon," she begins. "I'm really sorry."

"Wrong answer," I whisper. I rest my forehead against hers.

"But I am," she insists.

"I'm still not," I reply. "But Katherine is human and unconscious at the school?"

"She was right before I got here."

"And it's not even my birthday," I say as I take my phone out of my pocket.

"When is your birthday?" Elena asks as I pull up my contacts.

"Wouldn't you like to know?"

"Actually, yes. That's why I asked. Because that's what people do when they love each other. They celebrate birthdays. What are you doing?"

"Texting Klaus the location of his precious human doppelganger blood."

"Damon!" Elena reaches for my phone just as I hit send. I hand it to her with a shrug. "He's going to take her to New Orleans and use her to make more hybrids."

I shrug. "She may be human, but she's still Katherine. She'll figure a way out. But he can have her until then. Serves her right, and he did save me and all." Once more I pull her towards me. "What can I say? I'm feeling magnanimous." I nuzzle my nose along her cheek.

"I have a feeling you're going to be a terrible boyfriend, Damon Salvatore."

I nod my agreement. "Probably. I suspect I'm emotionally stunted."

She laughs. "And arrogant. And infuriatingly stubborn."

"Yes. It's a good thing I'm so attractive, or I wouldn't have anything to offer you."

"You're far too old for me. It's actually quite creepy."

I nod again.

"And I love you," she says. I don't think I'll ever get tired of hearing her say that. "I love you, Damon Salvatore."

I pull her onto my lap and kiss her. "I loved you first," I point out.

She laughs again, a sound I haven't heard enough of in too long. "Really? We're going to play the 'No, I love you more?' game? Are we twelve?"

"We can be whatever we want," I say. "We can start over."

She looks serious when she asks, "What about Stefan? What are we..."

"No," I interrupt. "Please. Trust me when I say I understand, and I want to hurt him even less than you do. And he is hurt, and we need to deal with that, and we will as soon as we get home. But just for now, for this moment, can we not." I sigh. "Can we think happy thoughts for five minutes?"

"Only five minutes?" she teases.

I kiss her and whisper, "I remember what we did with five minutes last time."

She laughs. "As I recall, it was five minutes over and over and over."

"And over," I agree. "But where do you want to go after we get Stefan settled? Let's get out of this town. Let's see the world."

"I didn't fill out my college applications, Damon. I need to see if I can get accepted somewhere."

I shake my head. "I'm talking vacation, Elena, not school. You have the rest of forever for college. Besides, you've missed too much school these past two years. I'm surprised they let you graduate at all. It was a pity diploma for sure. I think you need some home schooling."

"Home schooling?" she asks, her eyebrows raised.

I nod, feigning sincerity, but my mind races with images of her in school girl skirts. I smile when I think about all the things I can teach her and show her and experience again through her eyes. It's a new beginning, for both of us.

"Professor Salvatore, at your service. I hold several degrees, you know."

"No," she says, shaking her head. "I didn't know. I'm beginning to think there's a lot you haven't told me."

I trace my finger through the tear in the bodice of her dress. It reminds me of the dress she wore to her eighteenth birthday, but the woman sitting on my lap isn't the girl I fell in love with. She's right. We've both changed. And yet we're the same too. And here we sit at the Grille, where she drank from me all those weeks ago. She wrapped herself around my cupped hand and drank the blood I offered her, and I didn't think my life could ever get better than that stolen moment. But this time, for the first time in my long life, I haven't stolen anything.

She's made an honest man out of me.

"I don't intend to let you out of my sight for at least a decade," I whisper, running my nose along her hair. "Maybe two."

"I'm fine," she says.

"The problem is that I don't believe you when you say that."

"I guess we'll both have to learn how to live with each other," she says with a smile.

I take her hand in mine and hold it over my heart. "I can live with that."


	35. Ambuscade

_A/N: Expanded Stefan POV from Graduation (4.23)_

* * *

**Ambuscade**

Murder was my first act in this life. No one ever made accusations or even talked about it, but I'm not blind. I always knew the date on my mother's gravestone was the same as my birthday. And when Father called Damon a coward when he came home from the war and refused to return, I overheard the slaves talking about the night I was born. The night my mother died. They said Father left the house. He couldn't stand the sound of her screams, and he rode off into the dark. Damon stayed. He was the last one who saw her alive.

I've always wondered if she knew my birth would take her life, and if she did, if she thought that seemed like a fair sacrifice. Her life for mine. Balance. Because apparently nature always demands a balance. Does everyone have a shadow self? Is there another Mystic Falls somewhere, another sleepy little town full of monsters and magic?

I hate magic, and I hate monsters. So I guess it makes sense that I hate myself.

I keep telling myself not to panic, but I don't seem to be listening. I think maybe a couple of days have passed. It's impossible to tell for sure, but I can feel the hunger. It hasn't taken over my mind yet, but it's always there now. The ache in my gums, the dryness in my veins that leaves a terrible stiff pain that never goes away. When I'm able to doze, I dream of blood.

Yeah, I'm hungry. And I'm definitely panicking.

I tried to brace myself against the metal sides of the safe as it banged its way down into the quarry, but the smooth surface was slippery and there was nothing to grip. So I crashed and tumbled inside the small space. The descent took forever, my life flashing before my eyes the way they say it will when I die. The way it did when I did die all those years ago. When I lay bleeding on the road after my father shot me, only seconds could have passed as I looked at Damon and tried to reach him, but my hand was too heavy and he was already dead beside me. It must've been just a few seconds, but it felt like longer than my entire life up until that point.

The splash, when the safe landed in the quarry, was deafening and immediately water began flooding into my tiny cell.

I pried my phone from my pocket and frantically texted Damon: _Silas looks like me. I'm in the quarry._ I sent it, but water made the screen go black. I don't know if he got it or not. Since I'm still here, I'm afraid it didn't go through. But in the pitch blackness, without the brightness of screen, I desperately gulped at the remaining air, my head pressed painfully against the corner of the safe.

I can't drown. I don't need to breathe. But I can't die, either. Not like this.

Water took over the last of the air as I felt the safe settle at the bottom of the quarry. I held that final breath in my lungs for a long time, reminding them they breathe only because they like to, not because they need to. I need air to speak and to smell, and I won't be doing either. Not anytime soon.

When I finally let that last stolen breath escape, I wished like hell I could see the bubbles.

The safe is too small to stretch out in, and Damon tested it to make sure no one could escape. He's stronger than I am. I take just a tiny sip of human blood every day. Just a sip. And I thought he was insane when he asked me to lock the door behind him.

"Give me at least an hour," he said.

"That's too long," I replied, shaking my head. "Five, ten minutes."

Damon shook his head. "I need enough time to get creative. Don't be a pussy."

I had to go upstairs and take a long shower so I couldn't hear the pounding and creaking of metal as he struggled to get free. I was as cowardly as our father.

I shift my legs into as comfortable position as I can and try not to bump into the metal sides. I don't want to be reminded how small this space is. I wonder if this is what it felt like to be inside my mother, curled up in the watery dark quiet.

Damon will find me. He'll know in a second Silas isn't me, no matter how much he looks like me. Elena will know. Unless he leaves town, like I said I was going to do, in which case it could be a while before they notice. And if it does take them a decade or two to figure it out, at least Elena won't be with Silas thinking he's me. Thank God she chose Damon.

I didn't think I'd say that, not anytime soon. Not when I eavesdropped and heard those words. Damon was so angry when he spit out how not sorry he was, how he would rather die than let her watch him grow old and frail. When he reminded her how wrong he was for her. But I know my brother, and he wasn't mad at her. His best cruelties, his finest horrors and most exquisite pains, are always against himself. He was punishing himself with that terrible, selfish truth. Only she didn't run away from him like she has in the past. Elena got mad at him right back. The fiery Elena I love wouldn't let him take all the blame, just as she never let me. And then she said it: she's in love with him.

If I'm being honest with myself, and why the hell wouldn't I be at this point, she's probably been in love with him for a long time. Far longer than she consciously knows.

Her declaration of love was cut off by the sound of kissing. I imagine Damon raced across the room to get his hands on her. I heard the whisper of fingers against fabric, and they both made quiet noises that seemed to come from someplace deep inside them. I suspect, if the house hadn't been full of me and Lexi and Ric, he would've scooped her up and carried her off to his bed.

It's what I would've done.

The Damon who arrived in Mystic Falls two years ago would've carried her upstairs regardless of his audience. Maybe especially because of his audience. I know he stopped that kiss and didn't take it further because I could hear. As mad as we get at each other, for all the times we've threatened and stabbed and worse, I know Damon loves me because he knew I was listening, and he didn't want to make noise when I would hear.

All the times I made plenty of sounds, knowing he loved her and wanting him to hear her with me, and when she finally admitted what we all knew was true, he was content just to kiss her to spare me. Then again, I know what it's like to kiss Elena. She kisses like she needs to show you how much she loves you more than she needs to breathe.

If Lexi's hand hadn't been resting on my shoulder, I would've left because hearing those words and that kiss was like having a hand squeezing my heart. I tried to remind myself that I love in my head, not that place in my chest, but that's where I felt the crushing pain as I listened to them. Did his hands creep under the hem of her little dress, I wondered? Did she wrap her arms around his neck and run her fingers through the hair at the back of neck, like she used to do to me?

But with Lexi there, I was able to take a breath. And then a second. And I as I breathed in her scent and felt the comforting weight of her hand on my shoulder, I realized I wasn't mad. I thought I would be furious at him. I knew, from that first day I found Elena in the parlor with Damon, I could lose her to him, which is why I did everything in my power to make her see how wrong he was for her.

Only he knows he's wrong for her, and she knows it, and even though it's all wrong, it's always been right too.

As I listened to them kiss, a quiet sound no human would've been able to hear, I realized that as much as it hurt, mostly, I was happy for him. Because Damon has never felt good enough. Not when we were alive, and certainly not since.

In the end, if I can't have her, I'd rather she be with my brother than anyone else.

Obviously, it was a terrible mistake to not let him come with me. I knew it when I told him no even though Silas was supposed to be a harmless hunk of stone. I told myself I was being generous, letting him have time with Elena without worrying about me nearby and listening. But I knew that wasn't the truth. I didn't want to talk about it. I didn't want him to feel guilty or worry about me. I didn't want to sit in uncomfortable silence and purposefully not look at each other while we both pretended he wasn't terrified I was going to go off the rails again.

I didn't want to pretend that wasn't a distinct possibility without Elena to remind me who I wanted to be.

So I told him to stay. I told him I had Lexi even though I knew that would hurt him because Damon has never gotten along with Lexi. But I did it because I needed to be with her, the one person I can truly be myself with. She's witnessed me at my very worst, always, and I've never tried to pretend to be anything other than weak and selfish and terrible, and she loves me anyway.

I thought, once, she was my one. She'd saved me, again, before drifting back to her life and leaving me to mine. But every year, no matter where I was, she found me for my birthday. I don't know how she did it, but a year didn't go by without her turning up. It was my one-hundred and fortieth birthday, and I'd graduated from college that spring. Again. There wasn't a single person in the audience clapping for me. No one who wanted me in their photo to commemorate the milestone. I was drifting, lost and alone and wondering what I was supposed to do with my life. Again. We went to see Bon Jovi and danced in the front row and sang along, and during the encore, I kissed her.

"Oh Stefan," she said after she pulled away from me. The crowd around us screamed and jostled and didn't care that I was declaring my love. But she rested her hand on my cheek.

"Lexi, I love you."

"I know that," she said. "And I love you. But Stefan. No. Not like that."

"Lexi."

"I'm sorry."

And then she was gone. We never spoke of it. Not when she showed up the following year. Not ever again. But last night – or has it already been two nights? When we were in the car, I thought maybe, just for a moment, she admitted that maybe she did love me like that. Or she could have.

Not that it matters. She's gone again and I'm here. Maybe Lexi can find someone like Jeremy, someone who can hear people on the Other Side. Maybe she'll find a way to get a message to Damon.

God, I'm pathetic. That's even more desperate than the text.

But I spent the first hours trying in vain to escape, and I haven't given up. Not yet. I kick against the metal door again. I kick even though I know it's futile and I won't be able to get free. That's why we wanted to bury Silas in this safe; it's impenetrable. But I try anyway, while I still can. I kick before my body starts to desiccate and I'm left trapped inside my mind. I kick because I killed my mother. I kick because I let my father toast Damon the night before he left for war.

He raised his glass at dinner. "To the glorious cause and the Commonwealth of Virginia." I waited for him to toast Damon, who was leaving. Damon, who might be killed. Damon, who wouldn't let me come with him even though boys my age were signing up to be drummer boys. Damon solemnly nodded and raised his glass and when he looked at me, I quietly added, "Please hurry home."

I stole the decanter from Father's study that night and slipped into Damon's room. He was awake when I opened the door, and he held open the blankets so I could crawl into bed with him even though I knew I was too old for such things. I offered him the heavy crystal, amber liquid sloshing around inside.

"Have you ever had anything stronger than watered-down wine?" he asked. I could hear the smile in his voice as he took a sip. I shook my head, and he quietly laughed as he put his arm around me. "I appreciate your gesture, brother, but I have to warn you, it's an acquired taste. I thought I was going to throw up the first time Father offered me a drink."

He handed me the decanter. It was too big for my hands and awkward to drink from. Even though the smell made me want to gag, I swallowed. I coughed and spluttered as the liquor burned my mouth and my throat. It felt hot and awful and made my stomach churn, and I worried I would be sick in his bed.

"That's right," he said, thumping my back. "Breathe through it."

"I want to come with you," I finally said. "You'll keep me safe."

"Oh Stefan," he said with a sigh. He put the decanter on the bedside table and pulled me close to him. "I can't promise you that. I can't promise I'll be able to keep myself safe. I need you here. I need to know you'll be waiting for me if I come home."

I kick again because I killed our father and Damon has never blamed me for it, just as he never blamed me for killing our mother. I kick for Lexi dying and Ric dying and Jeremy dying and Elena's lost humanity because everyone she loves always dies. I kick for all the times I should've killed Katherine but couldn't because somewhere, deep down inside me, part of me still loves her. I kick for the love Lexi promised me, the woman I haven't met yet and now, maybe I never will. I kick because there are so many bodies sharing this watery grave with me, and everyone knows it, which is why no one ever drags the quarry when someone goes missing. Zach is down here somewhere. And that girl Katherine killed at that party whose name I can't even remember. There's a good chance this safe is resting on top of someone's bones. Maybe even a whole pile of decomposing corpses. I kick because that makes me want to gag and I can't. I kick because part of me will always love Elena, and she will always love me, but like Lexi, it'll never be enough or in the right way.

I feel the dent in the heavy metal, but that's all my efforts have produced. A dent. The door is still firmly locked. I want to sigh or scream, but I don't have air for either.

Elena. She so desperately wanted the cure. She lost her brother trying to find it. And yet she handed it over to me. That's when I knew for sure what she would say to Damon. She was choosing him over herself, and she loves me enough, even though she's in love with him, to give me my out. She was giving me my second chance to undo what Katherine did against my will all those years ago. It was left unspoken, but as I held that little vial in my hand, I knew she and Damon would stay with me while I aged. They would take care of me when I got old and look after my human descendants after I died. They would mourn me and miss me for as long as they were on the earth themselves.

I held the cure in my hand, proof that Elena loves me, just not enough. And I said no even though she's right: I'm a terrible vampire. Maybe the worst vampire ever, and maybe it isn't my fault. Maybe it's because I'm Silas' magical human version and I was supposed to die, only I didn't, and that's why I'm a terrible vampire who ends up ripping people into pieces. I was never supposed to be immortal.

But just as I wanted Damon to turn all those years ago so I wouldn't be alone, I didn't want to take it back and leave him. But he isn't alone anymore. Neither one of us are.

I told Caroline I don't hug as we stood in the parking lot before graduation. My seventeenth graduation. And she laughed and told me to get over myself and squeezed me just a little too hard. It's not that I don't hug. It's that I usually can't. Because I don't let people know me well enough to want to hug me. Because I don't trust myself not to hurt people. But Matt's the only human left, and no one will let me hurt him. I'm surrounded by people who'll make sure I stay me. People who love me and remind me I can be that version of myself.

The truth, which I suspect Caroline knows, is that for all my graduations, this is the only one I care about. Forget the shingles from Harvard and Stanford and Brown. This is the only one that matters. Not because I earned it. Hell, I missed more classes than I attended. But I was included in a cheesy group hug. My friends wanted me there with them. I belong somewhere. I'm not drifting through the world alone.

No, I don't have the girl. Not like I want to. But I do have her as a friend, and I have Caroline. And I have my brother again. For the first time, I have a life I actually want to live. I'm surrounded by people who love me.

Or I was.

**finis**

* * *

_A/N: This project started approximately seven months and 120k words ago with Damon day-drinking at the Grille in Justified (the one-shot that morphed into this monstrosity). I never intended to write this much or this long, so it feels fitting that the ending I'd intended to write to conclude this collection of stories can't happen because of the events of the finale. I was ambushed by unexpected twists and turns, and I honestly wouldn't want it any other way._

_I can't thank you enough, gentle readers, for accompanying me on this journey. I am overwhelmed by your generous praise and kind response. And there aren't words, I mean that quite literally, to express my appreciation for CreepingMuse. "Meeting" her was the universe smiling down upon me, and I am truly grateful. Thank you, my friend, for being so incredibly fan-fucking-tastic and seeing this through to the end._


End file.
